Abyssinia Oxytenanthera (Oxytenanthera abyssinica)
Description
Oxytenanthera abyssinica, Savannah bamboo is a stout, vigorous, evergreen bamboo that forms dense clumps of 20 - 100 canes. The thick-walled canes grow 3 - 15 metres tall; scarcely hollow, they are 8 - 10cm in diameter, The species sometimes forms immense, impenetrable thickets that can spread over several square kilometres, The plant is commonly harvested from the wild for its canes. It is sometimes also cultivated, especially for its seed, in the highlands of Tanzania, Dry forest and soudanian woodland,. Along banks of perennial watercourses, in damp places at the bases of hills, in moorland, on slopes of wooded hills, often on termite mounds from sea level to 2,000 metres, A plant of the drier to moist tropics, but avoiding the humid zones, it is found at elevations up to 2,000 metres, but mainly at 300 - 1,500 metres,. It occurs in savannah woodland areas subject to a climate with an average annual rainfall of over 800 mm and 3 - 7 dry months (where the average rainfall is less than 50 mm). It is absent from closed forest and extends little into semi-arid wooded grassland and thicket. Prevailing average annual temperatures are 20 - 27-c, with monthly average daily maxima of 30 - 36-c and daily minima of 7 - 17-c. Locally occasional frost may occur; if severe, this may scorch leaves, Succeeds on a range of soils so long as they are moisture retentive and also well-drained, Clumps take up to 6 years (from rhizome offsets) or 8 years (from seedlings) to reach the stem harvesting stage, A pure stand of Oxytenanthera abyssinica contains up to 750 clumps and 30,000 stems per ha, A newly germinated seed produces a single shoot in the first year, which may reach 1 metre in height from a small rhizome. By the third year, several shoots 1.8 - 3 metres long and 12mm in diameter can be produced from a rhizome that is 30cm long.
Taxonomic tree
-
Domain: Eukarya
-
-
Kingdom: Plantae
-
-
Phylum: Magnoliophyta
-
-
Class: Liliopsida
-
-
Order: Poales
-
-
Family: Poaceae
-
-
Genus: Oxytenanthera
-
-
-
-
-
-
