车筒竹 che tong zhu

Culms 15–24 m, 8–14 cm in diam., apically slightly drooping; internodes 20–26 cm, mainly glabrous but with a ring of gray silky hairs below basal 1 or 2 nodes; wall 10–30 mm thick; branching to base. Branches usually solitary at lower nodes, with tough thorns; branchlets interwoven; branches 3 to several above lower nodes. Culm sheaths tardily deciduous, leathery, densely stiffly dark brown hairy toward base, apex truncate; auricles usually reflexed, oblong to obovate, subequal, rugose, adaxially densely strigose, margin with undulate or erect setae; ligule 3–5 mm, dentate, fimbriate; blade erect or recurved, base ca. 1/2 width of sheath apex. Leaf blade linear-lanceolate, 7–17 × 1.2–1.6 cm, both surfaces glabrous or abaxially proximally pilose. Pseudospikelets solitary or several clustered at each node of flowering branch, linear to linear-lanceolate, slightly compressed, to 4 cm, prophylls obtuse, keels ciliolate; gemmiferous bracts 3–5, narrowly triangular or subovate, glabrous, obtuse; fertile florets 6–12; rachilla internodes 2–4 mm. Glumes usually absent; lemma ovate-oblong, 5–9.5 mm, many veined, apex obtusely acute or acute with fine tip; palea usually slightly longer than lemma, keels ciliolate, 3–5-veined between keels; lodicules 3, unequal, obovate, ca. 1.4 mm, obtuse, margins ciliate. Filaments distinct; anther obtuse at apex. Ovary narrow, apex thickened and hispidulous; style slender, hispidulous; stigmas 3. New shoots May–Jun, fl. Aug–Dec.

* Riversides, near villages. Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan.

The correct position of Bambusa sinospinosa var. inermis Keng & P. C. Keng is not known, and it is included with the taxa incertae sedis at the end of the genus.

This species is planted along rivers to protect the banks, and the culms are used for construction.