Here is a photo of Phy. edulis 'Heterocycla' from a visit to Hakone Gardens in Saratoga, CA a couple years ago. There are some better photos of them in the ground in Ted Jordan Meredith's Bamboo For Gardens. These were in large pots to the side of a larger stand of Phy. edulis (Moso) and vivax Aureocaulis. They were surrounded by the fence and that was as good a shot as I could get.

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Happy trails...

I rather like the interplay of the culm shape and the fence pattern and noted that before reading your comments. Notice that even the top of the far right culm seems to have the irregular internodes, though it is an illusion of the fence.

(The dried straight culm in the foreground is a tad annoying though.)

A really cool bamboo, that.

Hum, I had not noticed the lattice effect of the chicken wire on the bamboo before you pointed it out.

Interesting. Yes, the old washed look of the Tourtoise Shell bamboo is not that great. I have some newer photos of some Tourtoise Shell bamboo from my visit to see Ned and the gang at Bamboo Garden Nursery. They had bought a single culm plant and planted it sideways trying to get rhizones from the culm nodes, as there were no rhizomes in the root area. My thought is that Tourtoise Shell is just a variant of Moso, and not a separate species. Not unlike Phy. aurea and the way that it clusters, I have seen some aureas that have the true tortoise shell type compressed internodes much like 'Heterocycla'. Also many of the Tourtoise Shell bamboos at Hakone and other places I have seen have reverted to normal Moso.

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Happy trails...

Interesting about the attempt to get rhizomes from the culm nodes by planting it sideways. I take it that this has worked in the past with other Phyllostachys species?

IIRC, I seem to remember a posting from someone about burying a bunch of Pseudosasa japonica canes and having some of them root.

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Southern Indiana. Theoretically the same climate as 'needmore' & 'Eastlandia'.
My Bamboo List.

Wooooo!!!! I have 16 foot tall Moso in Southern Indiana!