Bambusa bambos, the Indian thorny bamboo, is a species of clumping bamboo native to southern Asia (India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Assam, and Indochina). It is also naturalized in Seychelles, Central America,West Indies, Java, Malaysia, Maluku, and the Philippines.
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Uses
They are extensively used in many works, mainly for making bridges and for ladders. Leaves are used for thatching.
Benefits
- Bamboo is used in manufacturing a number of products, like building materials, carpentry, farming, forestry, hunting and fishing apparatus, fuel and lighting, household, domestic and personal items, pulp and paper.
- The culms of bamboo are largely used in constructional work, tool handles, weapons, furniture, musical instruments, handicrafts, stakes, pots, etc.
- The leaves are sweet and have astringent, cooling, emmenagogue, opthalmic, vulnerary, constipating and febrifuge properties.
- The leaf sheaths of bamboo are urticant. They are used in food for criminal poisoning.
- The young new shoots of bamboo are eaten in Asia. Bamboo plants are especially cultivated to produce these shoots.
- Bamboo shoots are planted as ornamental or boundary markers and used in supporting banana plants.
- Bamboo extract is used to treat various inflammatory conditions.
- Its sprouts are acrid, bitter and laxative and are helpful in inflammations, ulcers and wounds.
- Split stems of bamboo are used for making baskets, fences, roofs and roof tiles.
- In India, bamboo is used for making paper, since it provides good quality paper pulp.
- Stem sheaths of bamboo are used as covers for beehives.
- The bamboo resin (tabasheer, banshalochan) has astringent, acrid, sweet, cooling, expectorant, constipating, cardiotonic, haemostatic, aphrodisiac, and diuretic properties. It is used to treat infantile epilepsy.
- Bamboo is used as an abortifacient for kidney troubles.
Cautions
Bamboo should not be used by pregnant and breastfeeding women, unless so prescribed by their doctor.
Interactions
None are recorded.
Other names
Bambusa Vulgaris, Bumbusa Apous, Bumbusa Orientalls, Bumbusa Spinosa, Bambusa Nutans
References
Source: Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bambusa_bambos#Uses
IloveIndia, http://www.iloveindia.com/indian-herbs/bambusa-vulgaris.html