Tubo
Saccharum officinarum · Sugarcane
- Names in the book
- Cañamiel, Caña de azúcar, Caña dulc, Sp.; Tubo, Tag.; Sugar Cane, Eng.
- Used for
- Cough and asthma
- Colours
- flowerwhite, purplestemgreen, purple
- Native range
- New Guinea
- In the Philippines, per the book
- Throughout the islands, especially in the Island of Negros and the Luzon Provinces of Pampanga, Bulacan and Nueva Ecija.
- Family
- Poaceae, filed in the book under Gramineæ
- Printed as
- Saccharum officinarum, L.
- Sources
- Page 241 on Project Gutenberg · Wikipedia
The plant today
Saccharum officinarum is a large, strong-growing species of grass in the sugarcane genus. Its stout stalks are rich in sucrose, a disaccharide sugar which accumulates in the stalk internodes. It originated in New Guinea, and is now cultivated in tropical and subtropical countries worldwide for the production of sugar, ethanol and other products. It is one of the most productive and most intensively cultivated kinds of sugarcane.
Excerpt from “Saccharum officinarum” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Recorded in the Philippines
GBIF holds 308 records of this plant from the Philippines. The ones with map coordinates fall in 31 provinces, most often Cebu (36), Bukidnon (35), Davao del Sur (27), Zamboanga del Norte (21), Maguindanao (12), Leyte (10), North Cotabato (10), Nueva Vizcaya (10), and 23 more.
Counts from GBIF occurrence records, October 2026. They include planted trees and garden plants, and a province with no records may only lack collectors.
What the 1901 book says
A historical record, quoted as printed. Doses and remedies here are not medical advice.
Uses
The Filipinos are very fond of the fresh cane. The juice, which is extracted by means of primitive wooden presses, is used as a drink mixed with lemon juice or vino and is sold in markets and public places as a popular beverage on hot days. A tepid juice, extracted from heated cane is given for catarrhal troubles. This use of the juice is the only one peculiar to the Philippines. Its general use and properties are universally familiar and are amply treated in the materia medica.
Botanical description
This plant is so universally familiar that it is unnecessary to describe it. More than 20 varieties are found in the Philippines.
Recent research
The most cited papers since 2022 that name this plant in the title, pulled from Europe PMC in October 2026. Titles are the authors' own and the findings have not been reviewed here.
- Modification of cellulose from sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum) bagasse pulp by cold plasma: Dissolution, structure and surface chemistry analysis
- Potential impact of ultrasound, pulsed electric field, high-pressure processing and microfludization against thermal treatments preservation regarding sugarcane juice (Saccharum officinarum)
- Global Responses of Autopolyploid Sugarcane Badila (Saccharum officinarum L.) to Drought Stress Based on Comparative Transcriptome and Metabolome Profiling