Three species of farm-cultivated bamboo towering in Hawkinsville, Georgia. Credit: Audrey Gray This report was made possible in part by the Fund for Environmental Journalism of the Society of Environmental Journalists. As a kid, Lauren Lydick would pack up a towel, a Harry Potter book, and head out alone into the bamboo groves. As a teenager, she took a blanket, War & Peace , and weed. Sometimes reading, sometimes just lying on her back looking up through the green, Lydick felt like she could be anywhere. Thailand, maybe, or Malaysia. It’s said that in rural parts of Japan, parents tell their children, “If you feel an earthquake, run into the bamboo. Its roots will hold the earth together for you.” Lydick felt that sense of protection somehow, even though she lived in Imperial County, California, one of the hottest, most polluted places in North America. And even though there was no escaping her easily-triggered, asthmatic chest. Lydick’s nickname in high school was Pneumonia. She laughs about that now, at 23, and remembers it not as a mean, bullying thing so much as camaraderie. Most of Lydick’s friends had asthma too—they’d share inhalers and watch out for each other in […]
The Radical Case for Growing Huge Swaths of Bamboo in North America

Latest Articles
One Large Pie, Extra Sustainability: Dispelling Pizza Box Recycling Myths
By Jeff Chalovich, chief commercial officer and president, Corrugated Packaging, WestRock Whether delivery or takeout, as a weekday reprieve from cooking or festive...
Rare Amazonian cactus flowers for first time in UK
A rare Amazonian cactus called the moonflower has bloomed for what botanists believe is the first time in the UK. Experts at Cambridge...
Renewable energy could render five of Australia’s remaining coal plants unviable by 2025
Up to five of Australia’s remaining 16 coal power plants could be financially unviable by 2025 due to a flood of cheap solar...
The new green paper sector doesn’t need trees
Canopy executive director Nicole Rycroft stands next to straw bales at Columbia Pulp Mill in Washington. Rycroft photo For Nicole Rycroft, the first...
One Tasmanian’s 54-year obsession to catalogue all of the world’s edible plants to end...
Agricultural scientist Bruce French has been cataloguing food plants for five decades. When agricultural scientist Bruce French was teaching agriculture in Papua New...
Nearly 200 Florida manatees filmed basking in shallow waters with dolphins
Video is unusual in that it captures species that don’t interact often in high numbers as manatee numbers are down Hundreds of Florida...