Tonkin Cane

The culms are of high mechanical quality, and large quantities are exported to other countries of SE Asia and the United States. The species was once highly prized for making fishing rods and ski poles.

Culms 6–13 m, 2–6 cm in diam.; internodes olive-green, terete, 30–40(–50) cm, smooth, initially gray waxy; wall thick; cavity filled with lamellate or spongy pith; nodes weakly prominent. Branches (1–)3 per node, deflexed, secondary branchlets undeveloped. Culm sheaths gradually deciduous, brown, rigid, fragile when dry, densely setose, margins with cilia ca. 1.5 cm, apex truncate or raised on both sides; auricles absent; oral setae few, erect, ca. 1.5 cm, rigid, undulate; ligule arcuate, irregular, ciliate; blade erect, dark brown, narrowly triangular, scabrid, sharply pointed. Leaves 2 or 3 per ultimate branch; sheath glabrous, margins ciliolate; auricles minute; oral setae curved, 7–15 mm; ligule 1–2 mm, densely ciliolate; pseudopetiole ca. 5 mm; blade narrowly lanceolate, 16–35 × 1.6–3.5 cm, thick, glabrous, secondary veins 7–9-paired, one margin spinescent-serrulate, other margin obscure. Inflorescence paniculate, lateral spikelets 3–15, 2.5–5.5 cm, rachilla internodes ca. 3 mm; florets 5–16. Glumes 2, unequal, densely puberulous or glabrous, margins apically densely ciliolate; lemma ovate-lanceolate, densely puberulous or glabrous; palea broadly lanceolate, keels puberulous. Lodicules unequal. Stamens 3. Ovary fusiform, glabrous. Caryopsis 5–6 mm. New shoots Mar to late May.

* Widely cultivated in plantations along streams in mountain areas, open slopes; low elevations. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hunan, S Jiangxi.