Bambusa vulgaris Schrad. ex Wendl.

Bambusa auriculata Kuntzee, Bambusa monogyna Blanco, Bambusa sieberi Grisebach
Common Name: Bakal (Bengal); Sunderkania bansa (Orissa), Barak (Assam), Lam Sameibi (Manipur), Mirtinga (Tripura), Vairua (Mizoram), Sunderkania bansa (Odisha), Pachamula (Malayalam)

Habit
Culms : Tufted Height: 8-20m  Diameter:5-10cm  Culm Color: Yellowish
Internode Length: 45cm  Culm Sheath Colour: 15-25 cm long and 25-35 cm broad, rounded and truncate at top, oftenbeautifully streaked when young with green and yellow, striate, adaxial surface densely covered with thick appressedbrown-black hairs, edges ciliate; ligule 5-8 mm tall, continuous with the top of the sheath, dentate or sometimes entire, margin ciliate; auricle 2, subequal, continuous with the blade, ca. 1 cm high with pale stout curved bristles 6-8 mm long;blade somewhat triangular, bright yellow, acute, 5-15 cm long and up to 10 cm broad, appressed-hairy with shining blackhairs on adaxial surface, margins bristly.

Length of Leaf: 15- 25cm  Breadth of Leaf : 2- 4cm  Leaf Shape: Narrowly or broadly lanceolate

Habitat: Evergreen Forest  Altitude: 1500m  Soil: Moist soils, Moist alluyvial soil, sandy and clayey soil

Native to: China
Introduced to: North-East India, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur, Mizoram, Odisha, Tripura, West Bengal, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka

Description of Inflorescence and Flower: large leafy compound panicle bearing spicate branches with heads of spikeletsin bracteate clusters of 3-10, the clusters larger at the nodes; rachis rounded or somewhat furrowed, scurfy, end segmentshairy. Spikelets 1.5-2 cm long, oblong, acute, compressed, bearing 1-2 empty glumes, 6-10 flowers, and one imperfectflower; rachillae cuneate, glabrous, not apparent; empty glumes ovate-acute, ciliate at tip, many-nerved; floweringglumes similar but larger; palea as long as or a little longer than flowering glume, bluntly acute, 2-keeled, white-ciliateon the keels, faintly 3-nerved; lodicules unequal, usually two, ovate-oblong, the third longer, acute, long white-ciliate,3-veined, membranous. Stamens exserted, purple; anthers narrow, blunt, hairy, apiculate. Ovary narrowly oblong, hairy, surmounted by a long, thin, hairy style with 3 short plumose stigmas.
Flowering Cycle: 40 years  Flowering Reported:West Bengal(1880-88), North-Eastern India(1974,1981-82)

Propagation:Culm cuttings

Uses: Construction, scaffoldings, pulp and paper, fence, decoration, handicraft

References: Seethalakshmi K. K,1998; Rao A.N, 1999; Manual for establishment and management of bamboo plantations, march 2005