Ratoon crops cannot be perennially renewed, and may be harvested only for a few seasons, as a decline in yield tends to occur due to increased crowding, damage by pests and diseases, and decreasing soil fertility.
The earliest record for ratooning, in a crop plant, can be traced back to the Vedic period in India.
Ratooning reduces the cost of cultivation by dispensing with additional seed material and some cultural practices such as land preparation and preparatory irrigation (palewa).
In Indian context, in subtropical India, ratoon initiated during spring (March) resulted in higher number of millable canes, cane yield and sucrose % juice in comparison to ratoon crops initiated either in winter (January) or summer (May).
The crux for such a success was trash mulching, application of lime and irrigation after harvest of the crop every year.
The latter, by and large, envisages the extent of multiple ratooning and their relative yield performance as compared to corresponding plant crop.
[12] Characters like higher plant cane yield, stalk population and sprouting of stubble buds are useful in selecting good ratooners.
Using the techniques of Panwar et al.,[19] roots remain active up to 106 days after harvest although they are relatively less efficient in nutrient uptake, possibly due to suberization and ageing.
If ratoon is initiated in April, tillering is profuse but mortality is high with poor growth of shoots.
[24] A ratoon crop ripens earlier, in general, by at least one to one and a half months or so due to: early development of shoots,[25] maintenance of relatively lesser N content in index tissues,[26] rapid run-out of N during grand growth phase[27] and relatively higher inorganic non-sugars in its juice.
[citation needed] The ICAR-Indian Institute of Sugarcane Research, Lucknow has identified certain technologies for ratoon management like dismantling of ridges, stubble shaving and off-barring at initiation of ratoon; gap filling when there is more than 45 cm distance (gap) between clumps; paired-row system of planting (120p x30) to reduce gaps and optimize plant population; trash mulching in alternate rows so as to conserve soil moisture, manage weeds and maintain soil organic carbon, etc.
The main benefits of ratooning are that the crop matures earlier (by one and half month or so) in the season and also decrease the cost of field preparation, preparatory irrigation as well as seed cane used for planting.
Being endowed with high rates of CO2 fixation, enormous capacity for storage of soluble compounds, metabolic transformation systems and containment of its genes, ensured by its vegetative propagation make sugarcane a desirable plant for its use as a bio-industry for synthesis of value–added products (molecular farming).
[36] In this endeavour, vast ratooning potential could be more helpful in containing desirable genes in such genetically modified plants for sufficiently longer rather more faithfully.
Examples include banana, cotton, mint, pearl millet, pigeon peas, pineapple, ramie, rice, and sorghum.
[citation needed] For example, the woody desert shrub guayule, an alternative source of natural rubber, is first harvested at two years, then ratooned annually in spring with a final crop that includes both tops and roots.