Edneyville couple preaches benefits of bamboo

Master bamboo gardener Keiji Oshima stands in a grove of "running bamboo" at his Haiku Bambo Nursery in Edneyville. The species can grow up to 50 feet high and is beloved by craftsmen for its hard, tough stems.

Than Axtell/TIMES-NEWS
Last Modified: Monday, March 11, 2013 at 3:45 p.m.

EDNEYVILLE — Deep in the heart of Apple Country, surrounded by fruit farms and packing houses, Keiji and Stefani Oshima have built a different form of nursery.

On their 18-acre property off Grant Mountain Road, the couple grow 23 varieties of bamboo, a species better known as panda fodder than a Carolina mountain crop.

Yet for the past 20 years, their Haiku Bamboo Nursery has been growing bamboo for sale to a wide variety of customers from across the Southeast, ranging from craftsmen who cherish certain species for flute- or basket-making to landscapers who use the fast-growing stems for screening, fencing and exotic flair.

“The majority are from North Carolina, but we get people coming up from Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee,” Stefani Oshima said. “They see our website and they come in with a trailer and they haul it home. Some, I think, have seen the beautiful bamboo gardens near Kyoto and they knew what they wanted for their home.”

Keiji (pronounced Kay-gee) Oshima also teaches classes in how to grow and maintain bamboo, as well as workshops on building Shakuhachi flutes, Japanese fences, split bamboo basket-making and preparing and eating the young, tender shoots. The couple sell many bamboo poles and crafts out of their warehouse on Tuttle Road.

While many customers come looking for bamboo flooring, the Oshimas say there's not enough bamboo in the United States to compete with China's supply. But there easily could be; some bamboo species can grow 70 feet tall in 60 days, they say, and multiply through extensive root systems, reducing the need to harvest mature Appalachian forests.

“Don't cut down the trees — cut down the bamboo, because they'll produce more plants for lumber, walls and flooring,” Stefani Oshima said, adding that bamboo gives off about 30 percent more oxygen than a comparable-sized grove of trees. “That's why we're going into education. We're hoping to teach the next generation, because there's no other school in the U.S. to teach people the many uses of bamboo.”

Those uses include soil retention and preventing landslides, screening homes from neighbors and a variety of crafts, from bamboo fly rods to arrows, vases and brooms. For landscaping, the Oshimas sell “semi-runner” species that form clumps under 10 feet high, as well as two species of runner bamboo — one nicknamed “Japanese Timber” — that can reach 65 feet tall.

Stefani Oshima is originally from Miami. After meeting at an African youth hostel in 1972, the couple married five years later in Keiji Oshima's native Japan, where Stefani Oshima gave birth to their daughter.

More than 30 years ago, they moved to the United States and eventually settled in Henderson County because the four-season, temperate climate was well-suited for growing bamboo.

“For strong quality, cold is better sometimes,” Keiji says, adding that the Appalachian climate is similar to that of his Japanese home.

It's fitting that the Oshimas chose to build their bamboo nursery here because river cane, a native related to the Asian bamboo they nurture, once covered much of the French Broad River valley. The early Cherokee used it for baskets, arrows and blowguns, according to historians, while settlers used it mostly to feed livestock.

“Farmers really had no idea what to do with it,” Stefani Oshima said, so they eliminated it to make way for more lucrative crops.

In modern times, Asiatic species of bamboo have gotten a bad reputation as invasive, but the Oshimas say they just require maintenance like any garden. They sell a plastic-lined root barrier for those who don't want to deal with spreading rhizomes.

If the plant does spread beyond a desired area, she advises, “use your lawnmower and just cut it down, or cut it and have a feast for your dinner tonight. It tastes wonderful.”

What about the older shoots?

“Your teeth have problem!” Keiji Oshima jokes, referring to their toughness.

Starting this month, the Oshimas offer walking tours of the Haiku Bamboo Nursery from 1:30-3 p.m. every second and fourth Sunday. Reservations are required. For more information about classes, call 828-685-3053 or visit www.haikubamboonursery.net.


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