BAMBOOSA BAMBOS

March 14, 2021

The “gregarious flowering of bamboo” inside the Wayanad Wildlife Sanctuary (WWS) may pose a threat to wildlife in the Nilgiri biosphere, a major tiger and elephant habitat.

About:

  • Bamboosa bambos is a monocarpic (flowering only once) plant belonging to the Poaceae family (grass family), and its flowering cycle varies from 40 to 60 years.

  • Bamboosa bambos is also known as the giant thorny bamboo, Indian thorny bamboo, spiny bamboo, or thorny bamboo.

  • It is a species of clumping bamboo native to southern Asia.

  • It is a tall, bright-green coloured spiny bamboo species, which grows in thickets consisting of a large number of heavily branched, closely growing culms.

Recent development

  • The bamboo groves in the Wayanad forest are the mainstay of herbivores in the Nilgiri biosphere during summer.

  • With the advent of the season, migration of wild animals starts from the adjacent sanctuaries in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu to Wayanad due to shortage of fodder and water.

  • The gregarious flowering may adversely affect migration, especially by elephants, wild gaur, and other lower herbivores owing to the mass destruction of bamboo groves after the flowering.

Source : The Hindu