#native bamboo

So now they have DNA samples from multiple in the area and they're going to sequence them and they'll get back to me on what species it is or if it's just a new weird one that needs to be described lol

Written August 22 2025. This text is public domain, share it wherever you want, no credit needed.

Some conservation group dig up whole entire clumps of cane at a time with bulldozers, but you likely won't have the resources to do that. This post will be assuming you're trying to clone smaller, more manageable sizes.

also: The difference between a root and a rhizome? Most plants have roots, you see them almost any time you transplant flowers from one pot into another. Not all plants have rhizomes though, which are like roots, but are actually modified stems. If you take a section of rivercane rhizome that's spent its whole life underground, where it'll likely be white, and expose it to the sun (while keeping it alive), it'll turn green and start to photosynthesize, and send out branches. Roots would likely just shrivel up.

What you need:

A native bamboo plant that you're able to dig up parts of.

A shovel with a point, either a full sized one, a spade, or a nice trowel, depending on what sort of soil you're gonna have to dig in.

Some sharp plant clippers, "anvil" style preferable to bypass. You may also be able to use some sharp kitchen shears, it depends on the size of the rhizomes.

Some damp paper towels or an actual towel.

Plastic wrap or a large zip lock bag, depending on the size of the rhizomes. OR a big bucket of water if you're getting a bunch and actually have a car.

A plant pot + nice soil to transplant it into (unless you're transplanting directly into the ground)

Step 1:

Find the native bamboo. You can look on this map on iNaturalist. If you're within any of the areas where it's normally found, or are near those areas, you can probably find some if you know what to look for.

If you're in an area surrounded by observations, but without any in your particular area, it's more likely to mean "no one's looked for it or noticed it here" rather than "aww, there's non here at all :(". Most people don't use iNaturalist AND don't look at or care about plants.

Step 2: Make sure you're allowed to dig there, and if you / the property owner haven't yet, call 811 to make sure there's nothing you might hit. You usually don't have to dig deep to get rhizomes, but you don't want to be the one who hits a gas pipe by mistake.

Step 3: Have your damp towels and plastic wrap / bag ready before you start digging, or have the water already in your big bucket if you're doing it that way.

Step 4: Plan where you're gonna dig. In early summer, when new shoots are starting to pop up, digging them up and replanting can work very well. You probably would not want to try transplanting an 8ft tall new shoot, though. Go for smaller sections of the plant that are fresh and green, or try to find rhizomes that haven't popped up yet.

Brush away leaves so you can look at the dirt itself. Sometimes you'll get lucky, and rhizomes will be right at or even above the surface of the soil, and you can just snip them off with your plant clippers.

Often, if you have the end of a rhizome, you can lift up upwards to expose more, then cut it when you have a good length that can be cut into smaller plants.

With some plants, rhizomes will be thin enough you can break them in half with just your hands. Most probably won't be like that, though, which is why you should have clippers, or at the very least, a trowel with a serrated edge. But trust me, you'll want the clippers.

If no rhizomes are visible at the surface, use your shovel and dig in a circle around the shoot you want to dig up, with some space to maintain any actual roots it might have formed already, going as deep as you need to to find the rhizome the shoot is coming from.

If you're really unlucky, you won't find any horizontal rhizomes at all, and will have no choice but to just cut as far down the vertical shoot as you can. This can still work for cloning, but isn't ideal.

Here's a good example of a great horizontal rhizome cutting (photo 4) And here's an example of a vertical rhizome cutting (photo 4).

To keep your rhizomes healthy until you can transplant them, wrap them in your damp paper towels or towel, then place them in the plastic bag, or use plastic wrap, or put them in your container of water.

When it's time to transplant them, either into a container or directly in the ground, make sure you mulch them well, and water them in, then, if it's not raining, keep coming back regularly to water them until they are established. If using containers, keep them in shade for the first few days, or use a humidity dome to help them keep their leaves alive. if they lose their leaves, keep watering them to give them the best chance to grow new ones. Whatever you do, don't let the rhizomes dry out completely.

I would like to introduce you to North America's native bamboos. There are three species, all hailing from the same genus - Arundinaria. Today they hardly get the attention they deserve but in the past, there were an incredibly important group of plants both ecologically and culturally. Today they occupy a mere shadow of this former glory so in keeping with the goal of In Defense of Plants, I am here to defend these plants. 

There are three species in the genus Arundinaria -- A. appalachiana, A. gigantea, and A. tecta -- and all of these are native to the southeast. There has been a whole lot of taxonomic debate over these plants ever since Thomas Walter first described the first of them in 1788. Since then, there have been many revisions. Whether or not any Asian bamboos belong in this genus is a story for another time but recent genetic work confirms that these three species are valid. 

Each differs slightly in its ecology. Giant or river cane (A. gigantea) is a denizen of alluvial forests and swamps as is switch cane (A. tecta), although switch cane seems to be a bit more obligate in its need for swamp-like habitats. Hill cane (A. appalachiana) was only described in 2006 and prefers dry to moist forested slopes and forest edges. One interesting things about hill cane is that it drops its leaves in the fall, an unusual trait for a bamboo. 

A majority of their reproduction is asexual via spreading rhizomes. All three species of cane rarely flower. When they do, plants usually die after setting seed. As such, a majority of canes you may encounter in the wild are clones connected by a vast network of large rhizomes. These rhizomes can persist for decades or even centuries meaning persistent patches are quite old. These rhizomes can lay dormant for some time as well, waiting for some form of canopy clearing disturbance to provide the conditions they need to grow again. 

Despite how common these canes may seem in some areas, they are nowhere near what they once were. European settlers wrote of vast stretches of rivers and swamps completely covered in cane. They called these "canebrakes" and they persisted as such due to the importance of Arundinaria to Native Americans. Regular burning created perfect conditions for cane to thrive and thrive it did. 

Because it was once so prolific, its ecological impacts were quite immense. Many animals relied on canebrakes for food, shelter, and a place to breed. Unfortunately, cane was also highly sought after as food for cattle. Unsustainable grazing took its toll, as did fire suppression. What's more, the rich soils and relatively flat topography in which these canes tend to grow was also the preferred spot for farming. In fact, settlers used canebrakes as an indicator of good soils. Vast acres of cane were cleared and plowed under. Unfortunately for cane and the habitat it created, when it disappeared, so did much of its function.

Once cleared, cane is slow to return. Its tendency to not flower frequently means few seeds are ever produced. Even clonal reproduction can be tedious if the right conditions are not present. Cane has lost most of the ground in which it once grew. With it went vital components of the southeastern ecosystem. It has even been suggested that the loss of canebrakes played a major role in the extinction of Bachman's warbler (Vermivora bachmanii) though it is hard to say for sure. 

Though all three species of cane still persist today, they are not the ecosystem builders they once were. It will take a lot of changes here in North America both ecologically and culturally before these three bamboos can ever regain much of their former range. Still, they are interesting plants to encounter and well worth taking some time to enjoy. 

Photo Credits: [1] [2]

Many of these stalks (and thus, the whole individual) are flowering for at least the second year in the row, including specialized flower stalks that emerge directly from the ground and do nothing but flower.

Please *do* put these on Wikipedia, it confuses me

(image description start. A collection of photos of American bamboo flowers and branch spikes. Most of the flowers are reddish purple, with some green edging, and pale yellow tassels hanging out. The branch spikes look like thick needles, in either purple to match the flowers, or green. One photo shows a segmented rhizome above ground, that is purple, and another shows the base of a cluster of thick branches, with multiple horizontal stripes. Image description end.)

How big the leaves are is dependent on the age of the shoot in question. Baby shoots have the biggest leaves. Older shoots have the smallest.

This is the exact same plant, just with shoots of different ages. The one with the big leaves is less than a year old. The one with the smaller leaves is 3+ years old.

[ID: A crapped screenshot from a video, looking up at the sky at the undersides of two bamboo shoots. One is slightly shorter and has very large leaves, The other is taller, with many many much smaller leaves. End ID.]

Right next to Big Papery Leaves. Who's also big, but with non-fuzzy leaves.

Very hard to measure and take pictures at the same time, so I have to improvise.

Also, today I learned:

in Choktaw:

Oski - Rivercane Konshak - Southern cane

This one is 142 inches tall, or 360 centimeters, give or take since it's getting too tall for me to actually reach all the way to the top.

[ID: Three photos from the same angle, showing a hand held up, looking up at the top of a cane plant where the newest leaf is still curled into a needle. The hand holds up fingers in each photo, spelling out 142. End ID.]

[ID: Two photos further down the same stem, looking at a large leaf, first pulled down to shop the top, then looking up at its underside. End ID.]

[ID: Two photos, now looking at the cane's stalk itself. It is green, with tan leaves clinging to it, then folding away where branches emerge. The second photo looks down the length of the stem to the ground, from a vantage point on a tall deck. End ID.]

[ID: Two photos of a different section of the plant, measuring a leaf with a measuring tape. It is 14 inches tall, and 2 inches wide in the middle. The leaf is healthy deep green, with raised small veins on either side, and a more prominent central vein. End ID.]

[ID: Three photos, the first showing the underside of the leaf, which is paler green than the top, and slightly glittery with the tiny, soft hairs. Then the top of the leaf again, then the hand holding the still-rolled leaf at the top of the plant for scale, which looks like a very long needle, probably the length of the person's forearm. End ID.]

[ID: Two photos showing a new stalk of the cane, stretching up into the sky from amidst a citrus tree. The second photo shows a tape measure being held on the ground next to the base with a blue shoe. The tape reads 9ft 3 inches. End ID.]

(The tape measure is 3 inches tall, so that stalk is actually 9'6")

[ID: Two photos, showing the front of the canebrake as it emerges into the sun. The stalks are topped with deep, healthy green leaves, and the stalks are deep green striped with their tan leaves. The second photo shows many plants, along with some of the cane stalks that have died back to grey sticks barren of leaves. Some of the other plants are: Cabbage palms, wax myrte, blackberries, muscadine grapes, and ferns. End ID.]

Air canals in the rhizome don't actually seem to be a consistent identifying trait of Sandcane (My name for Arundinaria tecta* cuz I'm not calling it after a fucking whip when they're literal gated communities for white people down here literally proudly calling themselves plantations).

The only plants I've found that have air canals in the rhizome are ones that are waterlogged and in extremely muddy ground almlst all or all times of the year. And I check the rhizomes of almost every single one that I find.

This one came out of mud in a ditch next to a road, it was actually uncovered by erosion, and already partially broken off.

[image description start. Four photos showing a rhizome, or root of a native bamboo plant, which has been chopped cleanly with clippers. The rhizomes inside is off-white, with a small hole in the center, a more solid surface in a circle around that, and around the very edge is an outer ring with tall slits space evenly around, forming air canals to help the plant transfer oxygen. Image description end.]