Sooty Mold???

[needmore]

My understanding of sooty mold is that it mainly affects the leaves. Here almost all of my culms are covered with something that looks like....well, soot, but none on any leaves. I have seen no aphid or ant activity and I can not find a single leaf that is 'sooted' but almost every culms has a sooty covering. Is this still sooty mold or perhaps something else? My gut tells me that it is a product of our hot & humid summers and that it is fungal in origin but as I said, only the culms have this condition. I've seen it at Adam Turtles in TN as well and he has similar weather.

Any ideas?

[Guest]

I have it on a Viridis Robert Young That was bought from TYTY I think it may have originated there because it has not spread to other bamboos that are very close to it; Dulcis and Aurea and an unknown.
Eric
NC