The Book of Bamboo

Bamboo's amazing versatility, strength, workability, and beauty have given it a longer and more varied role in human culture than any other plant known to humankind. This acclaimed sourcebook details the myriad ways in which this extraordinary plant is now used and presents many options for its use in the future. A bounty of facts and lore, the profusely illustrated book includes: Bamboo cultivation - how to grow, maintain, and harvest bamboo Crafts and constructions using bamboo: floors, fences, papers, playgrounds (built by kids!), swings, and treehouses A ''whole bamboo catalog'' of tools and other artifacts made from bamboo - acupuncture needles, blowguns, bridges, kites, ships, violins, windmills, and a thousand other bamboo things The seemingly endless variety of shelter applications, including lamination, ''plybamboo,'' reinforced concrete, and earthquake-zone construction Bamboo and the arts - a bamboo orchestra, the role of bamboo in the ancient ''friendship ceremony,'' Sumi-e painting, and the depiction of the quivering leaf of the bamboo plant An astonishing compendium of bamboo science, covering more than 1,200 species from 4 inches to 100 feet high (one species has been known to grow 4 feet in 24 hours)