Is our bagpipe reed cane a type of bamboo ?

Feo · Post by **Feo** » Mon May 01, 2006 12:54 pm

Hey guys

The other day I was helping a pennywhistle playing friend move out
of his old house into a new one... and in his backyard , not far from the
Delaware river I spotted some rather large cane growing . To me it
looks like the Spainish cane I bought years ago , ha ...Im sure it's
some sort of a bamboo-family plant. Is cane just another term for a bamboo ? Oh well, it was free...can't hurt in letting it dry out and give
'er a go someday ... Think of it.. wild NJ bagpipe cane

s1m0n · Post by **s1m0n** » Mon May 01, 2006 1:00 pm

Isn't hollowness of stem a bamboo trait?

Ted · Post by **Ted** » Mon May 01, 2006 1:09 pm

Bamboo is another giant grass, much harder than cane. Bamboo has a naked, bare stem. In cane, the stem is wrapped in leaf, like corn.

Joseph E. Smith · Post by **Joseph E. Smith** » Mon May 01, 2006 1:21 pm

Cane is closer related to grass than bamboo. It's stalk is hollow (except at the nodes) and has a lot of similarities to corn in structure.

tommykleen · Post by **tommykleen** » Mon May 01, 2006 3:02 pm

The two share taxonomy all the way through the Family level (Gramineae (Poaceae), but diverge below that. Many bamboos live and live and live and then all of the members of a population flower, fruit and die. I think Arundo doesn't follow this strategy, although I was at an event went all the chanter reeds appeared to die en mass.

t

Rockymtnpiper · Post by **Rockymtnpiper** » Tue May 02, 2006 10:36 pm

MAny people that think they have cane actually have Pampas Grass. Same goes with Bamboo.. lots of people think they have bamboo, and its just pampas grass.

I argued with the owner of a Chinese resturaunt about her "bamboo", she probably still thinks she has bamboo...

The stuff flowers EVERY year. Bamboo flowers every 100 years or so. I rest my case.

Feo · Post by **Feo** » Thu May 04, 2006 2:12 pm

Hey, thanks for the replies ... well , maybe I can take photos of the
stuff Nick Whitmer sent me and a photo of the stuff I found next to each other ... I see similarities ... well,it looks better then plastic anyway

Joseph E. Smith · Post by **Joseph E. Smith** » Thu May 04, 2006 2:44 pm

From my archives of Florida Wild Cane (Arundo Donax)....

RomanPiper · Post by **RomanPiper** » Mon May 08, 2006 11:09 am

I buy my reeds from a vendor in Edinburgh. He makes them from imported cane from Cameroon. I was told that it is a type of bamboo (he actually pronounces it 'bambook').