Weird and wonderful members of the plant kingdom - bamboo

Did you know that certain varieties of bamboo can grow three feet in twenty-four hours?

Not only that, one variety of bamboo the bambudoises was recorded as having flowered in the year 999AD, in China. Since that date, it has continued to flower, and then set seed once every one hundred and twenty years! The plant follows this cycle regardless of where it grows in the world, which means that every plant of the same species flowers simultaneously, regardless of where they have been planted.

The long life of the bamboo plant has made it into the Chinese symbol of longevity - whereas the closeness of the stems had led to it being the symbol of friendship in India. The extreme rarity of bamboo blossoming has led to any appearance of the flowers being regarded as a sign of impending famine. This is probably due not to the bamboo, but to the tendency of rats to feed upon the profusion of flowers, causing them to breed very swiftly, and then eat their way through large amounts of the local food supply

When treated, bamboo forms a very hard wood which is both light and exceptionally tough. In tropical climates it is used in elements of house construction, as well as for fences, bridges, toilets, walking sticks, canoes, furniture, chopsticks, food steamers, toys, and construction scaffolding. In China where it is used as a substitute for steel reinforcing rods in concrete construction, it has been used for buildings up to forty stories high! Another common usage is for Chinese musical instruments such as the dizi, xiao, shakuhachi, palendag, jinghu, and angklung - whatever they may be.

The shoots of bamboo are edible and are used in numerous Asian dishes, as we know from our own Chinese takeaway menus. In Indonesia they are sliced thinly and then boiled with coconut milk and spices.

Bamboo photograph by jam343, used under a creative commons attribution licence