Bambusa atra

Lindley

Long pipe bamboo, New Guinea thin-walled bamboo

PoaceaeSeeds/NutsShoots

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(c) abcdefgewing, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

iNaturalist · cc-by-nc
(c) Pete Woodall, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

What to Eat

Edible parts: Shoots, Cereal, Seeds

Edible Parts: Seed Shoots Edible Uses: Edible Portion: Shoots, Cereal, Seeds.

Where to Find It

It is a tropical plant. It grows in the lowlands and usually in wet soil. It can grow on limestone.

Asia, India, Indochina, Indonesia, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, SE Asia, Vietnam,

Countries: United Arab Emirates, Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Bahrain, Brunei, Bhutan, China, Georgia, Indonesia, Israel, India, Iraq, Iran, Jordan, Japan, Kyrgyzstan, Cambodia, North Korea, South Korea, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Laos, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Mongolia, Maldives, Malaysia, Nepal, Oman, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Syria, Thailand, Tajikistan, Timor-Leste, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Taiwan, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Yemen

How to Identify

A bamboo. The stems are 5-8 m tall and 204 cm wide. They are green and can have yellow stripes. The internodes are 40-70 cm long. Young shoots are slender. The leaf blades are 30 cm long by 5 cm wide. They are pale green underneath. The culm sheaths are 60 cm long by 10 cm wide. It flowers regularly but doesn't always produce seeds.

How to Grow

This species, however, is reported to flower regularly in cultivation without dying, though these specimens do not set seed. Carbon Farming - Cultivation: minor global crop. Management: managed multistem.

Propagation: Seed

Medicinal Uses

None known

Other Uses

Basketry Biomass String Tinder The thin-walled culm is used locally in basketry and other handicrafts. The culm is used for making water pipes, arrow heads and as a casual drinking vessel. Strips of the culms are used as binding material in roofings, fish traps and screens. The dead canes of this species are useful when lighting camp fires, even in wet weather. Carbon Farming - Industrial Crop: biomass. Other Systems: strip intercrop, multistrata. Special Uses Carbon Farming Food Forest

Wikipedia

Source ↗

Bambusa atra is a fast-growing evergreen bamboo reaching 8 m tall with a 2 m spread. Hardy to UK zone 10. It thrives in light sandy, medium loamy, and heavy clay soils across mildly acidic to very alkaline pH ranges. Requires full sun and moist to wet soil conditions.

Notes

There are about 120 Bambusa species. They are tropical and subtropical in Asia.

Names & Synonyms

Guagua bamboo, Loleba, Nena

Bambusa lineata MunroBambusa rumphiana Kurz.Dendrocalamus latifolius Laut. & K Schum.

References (4)

Dransfield, S. & Widjaja, EA., 1995, Plant Resources of South East Asia. PROSEA No. 7 Bamboos. Leiden. p 53
Martin, F.W. & Ruberte, R.M., 1979, Edible Leaves of the Tropics. Antillian College Press, Mayaguez, Puerto Rico. p 194
Penny Cycl. 3:357. 1835
Terra, G.J.A., 1973, Tropical Vegetables. Communication 54e Royal Tropical Institute, Amsterdam, p 27