This coverage is made possible through a partnership between BPR and Grist, a nonprofit environmental media organization.
On a hot sunny day in Fairview, a crew of six people unload a truck’s precious cargo – big buckets and plastic tubs containing little rivercane plants set in about a foot of soil. The group, convened by the North Carolina Department of Agriculture, takes the plants to the flowing Cane Creek — a site likely named for the native bamboo now being returned to its banks after a long absence.
There are more than 450 cane-related place names in the Southeast, according to Adam Griffith, a cooperative extension agent for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians who’s known as a regional rivercane wrangler. He doesn’t know for sure that the names are all tied to rivercane, but he guesses it’s likely. At one time, this grassy bamboo covered the banks and valleys of western North Carolina. But its population is not what it was…