P. bambusoides (Sp.ID?Ans) from WWII Burma (today Myanmar)

[TommyTuba]

A well documented local grove was started in 1946 by a US soldier returning from duty in Burma with Merrill's Marauders. It is clearly Phyllostachys (grooved with branches 2), height ranges to about 10-12 m, diameter to about 10 cm, mid-culm internode length about 8-10 cm. The culms are solid green after the sheath drops, and only one or two older plants have turned yellowish at the very top...the entire grove is basically bright green. The sheath is thick and leathery, light beige with very dark purplish-brown spots and vertical stripes...much more dark brown than light beige, so it is just convention that I refer to the lighter shade as the base color. There are absolutely no auricles at the top of the sheath, but there are a few bristles on either side of the little extended tip. The inside of the sheath is very smooth, but there are a few very tiny pubescent hairs on roughly the top 30% of the outside surface (you can hardly seem them, and they are not scratchy).

I'll be glad to measure or observe anything else that will help completely describe this plant for identification. Who has a suggestion?

TommyTuba

[Mark Meckes]

Hi Tommy, do you have any pics? You can upload them in your post if you do.
Also do you know the month / time the shoots emerged?
This is helpful as there are early, mid-season and later emerging species of Phyllostachys.

Mark

[TommyTuba]

Three pix uploaded...snapshot of the entire grove, a ten-foot shot of a new culm about 2 m high, and a closeup of a new culm about 1 m high. They're all big high-res jpg files...would you prefer smaller?

http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/2006NewGrowth_large.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3014&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/2006NewGrowth_small.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3015&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/2006NewGrowth_large.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3014&cat=500&ppuser=1804)

All shoots emerged sometime in the early to late spring...I can't be more specific until next year when we pay more attention.

I'll take more pix as you request...closeup of this and that and the other...if it will help identify the species with high confidence level.

By the way, I posted at about 2:00 and you responded at about 4:00...what took you so long!

Tommy

[Mark Meckes]

hehe, yeah there's a lot of poor sods who've been waiting 2 yrs for a reply.

See: Phyllostachys bambusoides (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showgallery.php?cat=548) at BamboFlora

If the young culms' surface texture is as smooth as a babies butt, this is what it is.
You'll notice from the gallery pics that the culms age quite differently depending on region grown, sunlight exposure and ambient humidity.

Nice pics!
This young shoot is aborting. Some do this.

http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/2006NewGrowth_small.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3015&cat=500&ppuser=1804)
Because bamboo has a short seasonal shoot growing period, it produces more than what can successfully survive ... as an insurance ... just in case.

Big pics are OK for ID but I've down-sized them to 800X600 - and started a gallery for you.
If you get some more nice pics you can upload them in the gallery or if you're unsure as to their acceptability, you can upload them here in your post first.

Cheers,
Mark

[TommyTuba]

Mark:
Because of the modest size of the culms, I never would have onsidered "Giant Timber Bamboo", but I believe that you really nailed the ID. Even though only about 5% of the culm sheaths have a hairy ear that is easily located, once you find one the appearance agrees perfectly with the descriptions in Darke and Griffith's Manual of Grasses.

http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmSheath_2_closeup.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3034&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmSheath_1_SideView.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3033&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmSheath_1_Blade_Auricle_.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3032&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmApex_ColorsVisible.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3031&cat=500&ppuser=1804)

One side of the grove runs uphill into a raised roadbed, and the power company has literally kept this mowed over the years so that there is a "heap" of roots and rhizomes and ground-level to 3-inch stumps all over the place...like punjii sticks, but blunt.

Out of this "heap" there are shoots growing almost like weeds, and I think that they look like the higher branches on the regular culms. Leaf auricles and bristles are clearly visible..

http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmShootsTilleringFromHeap.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3038&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmShootsTillering_2.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3037&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmShootsTillering3.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3036&cat=500&ppuser=1804) http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/CulmShootsTillering4.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=3035&cat=500&ppuser=1804)
Now we have to figure out how to groom the grove so it can be enjoyed.

[Mark Meckes]

This bamboo species does not grow well in the tropics as it prefers cooler temperate climates, so there may some missing links to it's past history of how it found it's way to this location.

Phyllostachys bambusoides culm sheath - Austin TX
http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/PbambusoidesAuTX050506-222.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=1148)
Note typical trait where auricles may not always be present or fully developed.

The slightly bulged nodes of smaller dia culms are another indicator.
One month old culm fresh out of the earth.
http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/data/548/thumbs/PbambusoidesAuTX050506-225.jpg (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showphoto.php?photo=1151)

Also new culms don't have a prominent white band below the node as some other Phyllostachys species do.

I have never seen this bamboo growing to the puported 6"diameter culms that the American Bamboo Society Source List claims it can get to.
However there is much in the world of bamboo that I have yet to see ...

I saw some large 4" dia culms of what was thought to be P. bambusoides near Macon Georgia, growing on a spring fed property, but the sample I brought home was thin walled and looked more like P. vivax. It was autumn so I couldn't ID from shoots.

A large grove in Louisiana had culms up to 3" in dia.

Mark

[Mark Meckes]

Hi Tommy,
About how much area does this grove occupy?
Do you thinks it's been there for 50-60 years?

I have a listing of 16 P.I #'s ie Plant Introductions of P. bambusoides that were introduced into the US through the (now defunct) USDA Plant Introduction Station in Savannah Georgia during the first half of the 1900's of which 5 accession still remain with their PI numbers intact. During this time various species were distributed and /or lost to the unknown.

Thinning out of older culms, indicated by a greyish coating, and removing smaller diameter culms growing amongst larger culms provides extra sunlight to the remaining culms, and improves the air circulation and overall health of the grove.
Reducing the density of culms and subsequent over competition of their feeder rhizomes can lead to the growth of larger sized culms eventually.

Mark

[TommyTuba]

Mark:
I paced the grove at roughly 100 feet long by about 30 feet wide. Half of the narrow dimension is a steep upward slope about 10-feet to a paved road. The other half is flat out to an underground drainage culvert of some sort (huge square inlet hole disappears into the ground). One end of the long dimension is lots of crushed rocks that are part of the drainage system, and I believe an effective rhizome barrier. The other end is normal forest vegetation. And the entire grove are is shared with other trees, some very large, with a great deal of shade. And I mean to tell you, the 2006 crop is growing like weeds!

I have an aerial photo from 1937 and the area is bare, but so far I cannot confirm for sure who planted it or when...only the original folklore in my first posting. We have a request circulating through all of the descendents for more facts or folklore. One possibility:

The soldier that supposedly planted the grove worked on a large farm near Oriental, NC (on the coast near the outer banks) for several years after WWII, then went to a 4-year college in Richmond, VA. Are any of your PI's in these two areas?

Thanks for your help so far. Maybe you can estimate the age from the dimensions above.

[Mark Meckes]

Hi Tommy,
If the grove wasn't restricted by natural barriers it would cover a larger area by now. However, at some period during the last century, this species flowered and may have resulted in a decline of the size of the grove for a number of years till it rejuvenated growth. (will need to do some additional research on this matter of flowering period)

The following contains some interesting tid-bits of information from the mid 1950's:
Excerpts from ...

Bamboos of the Genus Phyllostachys under cultivation in the United States
by F. A. McClure
Horticultural Crops Research Branch - USDA Agricultural Research Service
Agriculture Handbook No 114 - issued June 1957

Phyllostachys bambusoides
"The Giant Timber bamboo, native to China and cultivated in Japan for a very long time, has been introduced repeatedly and has been planted perhaps more widely in this country than any other bamboo.
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Side Note: Mentions (in 1955) that 11 nurseries offered P. bambusoides spp.
8 nurseries - carried P. bambusoides.
4 other cultivars/variants of this P. bambusoides were being grown at the 'Garden' - the now defunct USDA Bamboo Introduction Station - Savannah GA, USA
It is currently being maintained as an extension of the Savannah Campus of the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences as the Bamboo Farm and Coastal Gardens (http://www.bamboo.caes.uga.edu/)
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The earliest introductions of P. bambusoides, made by private individuals, are generally not very well documented.
Even the history of the plants (P. I. #40342) that produced the now famous grove of this bamboo at the Garden is incomplete.
David Fairchild says it was introduced by Adnreas E. Moynelo "probably in the late 1880's" and planted at the present site in 1890.
The precise origin of the material is in doubt.

P. bambusoides is represented at the Garden by other introductions as follows:
P. I. #12180 ; #77003 ; #118926 ; #128787.

In a culm 48ft 2in tall and 2 7/8in in diameter, with 60 internodes, taken from the midst of a grove, the first bud occured at node 24 (25ft 4in above the ground), and the first branch developed at node 28 (30ft 4 in above the ground).
Shoot initiation begins relatively late.
The typical form of this species is the one most cultivated in China and Japan for it's useful culms, and indeed may be the most versatile bamboo of the genus Phyllostachys.
Because of this versatility, the large size reached by the culms under favorable conditions, and the prolific production of edible shoots having only a slight degree of acridity even in the raw state, P. bambusoides has been favored by the United States Department of Agriculture and by farmers as one of the most likely to make a place for itself in the rural economy. It's only serious competitor in both size and vigor is P. vivax, whose culms are not so straight and for this reason less generally useful.
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Side Note: Another factor not mentioned here is that Phyllostachys vivax (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showgallery.php?cat=538) is thinner walled and less structurally resilient.
Nor is the largest species ... Phyllostachys edulis (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showgallery.php?cat=528), aka P. pubescens mentioned here, though referenced elsewhere ... "Though the wood is relatively soft in texture, the culms are much used in the orient and are perhaps second only to P. bambusoides in their versatility"
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Recently developed industries for the preservation of bamboo culms for the market and for the fabrication of an impressive array of specialties depend principally on the domestic supply of P. bambusoides.
It's minimum temperature tolerance is estimated as O F. It is hardy at Glen Dale MD and a few clumps are known to be thriving in Washington D.C.
Culms of this bamboo were included in studies on seasoning and physical properties carried out at Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina.
During World War II, culms of P. bambusoides were subjected to comparative tests along with 11 other species, representing 4 distinct genera, as material for making laminated (hexagonal) ski poles.
The following is quoted from a report on these tests.
" In workability, this species probably excels all of the species tested under this project with the exception of Tonkin Cane - Pseudosasa amabilis (http://www.bamboocraft.net/bamboo/showgallery.php?cat=599), aka Arundinaria amabilis.
Unfortunately P. bambusoides fell slightly below the minimal requirements of Test # 3 (span) in average performance.
Furthermore ... unimpregnated shafts ... 'take a set' regularly when subjected to moderate but firm lateral stress"
- F. A. McClure