撑篙竹 cheng gao zhu

Culms 7–10 m, 4–5.5 cm in diam., basally straight, apex suberect; internodes straight, ca. 30 cm, basal internodes with yellow-green stripes, initially thinly white powdery or strigose; nodes slightly prominent, basal nodes with rings of gray-white silky hairs below and above sheath scar; branching from basal node up. Branches several to many, clustered, with central 3 dominant. Culm sheaths deciduous, initially with yellow-green stripes, thinly leathery, abaxially glabrous or sometimes strigose, apex asymmetrically arched; auricles unequal, undulate, wrinkled; larger auricle slanted along 1/6–1/5 of sheath margin, obovate-oblong to oblanceolate, 3.5–4 × ca. 1 cm, attenuate; smaller auricle suborbicular or elliptic, ca. 1.5 × 0.8 cm; oral setae fine, undulate; ligule 3–4 mm, irregularly dentate or sometimes laciniate, shortly fimbriate; blade deciduous, erect, nearly symmetrical, initially abaxially yellow-green striped, narrowly ovate-acuminate, base rounded and then extending outward and joined with auricles for 3–7 mm, nearly 2/3 width of sheath apex. Leaf blade linear-lanceolate, usually 10–15 × 1–1.5 cm, abaxially densely pubescent, adaxially glabrous. Pseudospikelets linear, 2–5 cm, gemmiferous bracts 2 or 3; florets 5–10; rachilla segments ca. 4 mm. Glume 1, oblong, ca. 6 mm, 9-veined, glabrous, apex acute; lemmas oblong-lanceolate, 1.2–1.4 cm, glabrous, 13–15-veined, apex acute; palea nearly as long as or slightly shorter than lemma, ciliolate toward apex, 6-veined between and 3-veined on either side of keels; lodicules 3, unequal; anterior 2 oblique, ca. 2.7 mm, margins long ciliate, posterior larger, obovate-oblong, ca. 3 mm. Filaments short; anthers ca. 5 mm. Ovary ellipsoid, ca. 1 mm, apex hispidulous; style ca. 1 mm, hispidulous; stigmas 3, ca. 3 mm, hairy. Young caryopsis broadly ovoid, ca. 1.5 mm, apex hispidulous, remains of style base persistent.

* River banks, around villages. Guangdong, Guangxi.

Two varieties may be recognized in China. In addition, Bambusa pervariabilis var. multistriata W. T. Lin (J. Bamboo Res. 16(3): 25. 1997) was described from cultivated, sterile material from Guangdong (Guangzhou).