After-culture.—­In Mysore, the surface of the earth in the hollows in which the sets are planted is stirred with a stick as soon as the shoots appear, and a little dung is added.  Next month the daily watering is continued, and then the whole field dug over with the hoe, a cavity being made round each stool, and a little dung added.  In the third month water is given every second day:  at its close, if the canes are luxuriant, the ground is again dug; but if weakly, the watering is continued during the fourth month, before the digging is given.  At this time the earth is drawn up about the canes, so as to leave the hollows between the rows at right angles with the trenches.  No more water is given to the plants, but the trenches between the beds are kept full for three days.  It is then left off for a week, and if rain occurs, no further water is requisite; but if the weather is dry, water is admitted once a week during the next month.  The digging is then repeated, and the earth levelled with the hand about the stools.

The stems of each stool are ten or twelve in number, which are reduced to five or six by the most weakly of them being now removed.  The healthy canes are to be tied with one of their own leaves, two or three together, to check their spreading; and this binding is repeated as required by their increased growth.

In the absence of rain, the trenches are filled with water once a fortnight.

When the Putta-putti is to be kept for a second crop, the dry leaves cut off in the crop season are burnt upon the field, and this is dug over, and trenches filled with water, and during six weeks the plants watered once in every six or eight days (unless rain falls), and the digging repeated three times, dung being added at each digging.  The after-culture is the same as for the first crop.

In the Upper Provinces, Dr. Tennant says, if moderate showers occur after planting, nothing more is done until the shoots from the sets have attained a height of two or three inches.  The soil immediately around them is then loosened with a small weeding iron, something like a chisel; but if the season should prove dry, the field is occasionally watered; the weeding is also continued, and the soil occasionally loosened about the plants.

In August, small trenches are cut through the field, with small intervals between them, for the purpose of draining off the water, if the season is too wet.  This is very requisite, for if the canes are now supplied with too much moisture, the juice is rendered watery and unprofitable.  If the season happens to be dry, the same dikes serve to conduct the irrigating water through the field, and to carry off what does not soak into the earth in a few hours.  Stagnant water they consider very injurious to the cane, and on the drains being well contrived depends in a great measure the future hope of profit.  Immediately after the field is trenched, the canes are propped.  They are now about three feet high, and each set has produced from three to six canes.  The lower leaves of each are first carefully wrapt up around it, so as to cover it completely in every part; a small strong bamboo, eight or ten feet long, is then inserted firmly in the middle of each stool, and the canes tied to it.  This secures them in an erect position, and facilitates the circulation of the air.