There's a bamboo that’s native to the United States, called rivercane (Arundinaria gigantea) and it has an importance both for indigenous people and the natural environment. A group in southwest Virginia is working to restore the plant.
On a Saturday afternoon, a group of ten volunteers gather for a short hike in southwest Virginia. They tromp through mud and long grass.
They’re revisiting a patch of rivercane they planted three years ago.
Laura Young, with the Virginia Department of Conservation, says when they’re babies, these plants look like mere sticks that fit in the palm of your hand.
“But they’re these little scraggly things, like that, now they’re literally taller than us,” Young says.
This bamboo, that grows up to 30 feet, used to be abundant along rivers in much of the southeast.
“And then there’s also a lot of rare moths that we track that this is a specific host plant for,” Young says. “So this is the only thing that those moths can eat. If this plant is not there, the moths are not there.”
Since the 1800s, Rivercane slowly faded from riverbanks, as farmers cleared it to make space for agriculture. It’s now recognized as a culturally significant plant for many indigenous tribes, including the Choctaw and Cherokee, who use it for intricate, artistic basket weaving.
They’ve also been working to bring it back in Oklahoma, Louisiana, and North Carolina.
Young says their work has inspired her to grow rivercane here in Virginia.
As they stand near the river, one of the volunteers, Elizabeth Cooperstein is delighted to see these plants grow so well.
“Well it feels fun. It’s a lot of fun to do these things,” Cooperstein says.
And these volunteers are committed to the project. People like Abigail Burggraf, who holds her 3-year-old daughter, Susanna’s hand. Their rain boots are covered in mud. She says her daughter learned to walk when they came out to weed this patch of rivercane two years ago.
“She’d done the, like, taking a couple steps and then she just started walking around. So we were like, ok then. I guess we’re doing that now,” Burggraf remembers.
She and others helped start the baby river cane plants on their porches. They nursed them in plastic sandwich bags till they were ready to transplant.
Young says it doesn’t take a lot of technical expertise to grow a patch along a riverbank.
“Like this is something a sixth grade class could do,” Young says.
What began as five volunteers has now grown to 20. “I feel like the community’s really excited about this because it’s so important, and you can see it working,” Young says.
This year, this group planted 1000 rivercane along the Clinch and Powell rivers. Young hopes next year, they’ll add more riverbanks where America’s only native bamboo can grow again.
