24 PHILIPPINE BAMBOOS 



There is, however, reason to believe that much better results 

 than those recorded in Table 4 could be obtained as the dry 

 season of 1918 was unusually severe and the plants were not 

 irrigated. It will be noticed that there was a high percentage of 

 mortality between December, 1917, and June, 1918. Moreover, 

 many of the plants were probably subjected to too much shade, 

 as they were freed from vines only once during the year and in 

 general those plants which survived received more light than 

 those which died. 



The total cost of selecting, transporting, and planting the cut : 

 tings were 72.82 pesos per thousand. This cost was considerably 

 more than in the case of the 1912 plantation, which is accounted 

 for by the greater care used in the selection of cuttings for the 

 second than the first plantation. The superior cuttings used in 

 1917, however, gave much better results than the poorer ones 

 employed in 1912. 



It appears from the data derived from the planting at Los 

 Banos that the commercial planting of bamboo on a large scale 

 would be very profitable and that bamboo should be a valuable 

 reforestation crop. 



A number of bamboos, other than those here considered, have 

 been propagated from hard-wood cuttings at the Division of 

 Investigation of the Bureau of Forestry at Los Banos, and it is 

 probable that all or most Philippine bamboos can be thus re- 

 produced. 



GROWTH OF MATURE CLUMPS 



Actual measurements of growth of canes in mature clumps 

 are available for only three species, Bambusa spinosa, Bamhusa 

 vulgaris, and Gigantochloa levis. A clump of Bambusa spinosa 

 sends up yearly a number of shoots, the number in some cases 

 being as large as 130. In clumps from which the mature canes 

 are harvested, the number of new shoots may exceed the num- 

 ber left in the clump when the new culms are produced. A 

 considerable proportion of the young shoots die before reaching 

 maturity, many of them while still quite small. In Table 5 are 

 given observations on the number of shoots produced by 8 clumps 

 of Bambusa spinosa. The greatest number of canes produced 

 by any clump recorded in Table 5 is 128; these grew from a 

 clump having 49 mature canes. However, only 24, or 19 per 

 cent of the 128 canes, reached maturity. The average of all 

 the canes produced, by the 8 clumps, which reached maturity 

 is 28.5 per cent. In all, the number of mature canes produced 

 is 46.5 per cent of the total mature canes originally in the 

 clumps. 



