WICOMICO COUNTY, Md. -- County officials are looking to pass legislation that would help eradicate bamboo. It's an invasive species and it is spreading and sprouting everywhere, from Mardela to Salisbury.
The topic first came up at a work session on Tuesday, June 4th. Jim Adkins, who's backyard is infested with the tall and hollow plant, took the opportunity to speak up.
"I'd love to get rid of my bamboo, you got to have, in order to get what you need to kill it you got to have a license, because normal stuff won't kill this," said Adkins.
Adkins told us on Wednesday, his persisting bamboo issue isn't due to a lack of trying. His property backs up to Barren Creek, so chemicals are out of the equation. Plus, anytime he tries to chop down the bamboo, it grows back even quicker and even taller.
"I disked part of it up a month ago, I now have bamboo six feet tall, that's how fast this stuff grows," said Adkins.
But why is bamboo so bad?
Well, it supports invasive insects like beetles, termites and mosquitoes, it ruins natural areas and it grows very, very fast.
It's a problem the Salisbury Zoo, which would be included in the county's efforts to eradicate bamboo, has seen first hand.
"This area here was empty last summer," said Zoo Director Chuck Eicholz, pointing to an area now overgrown with bamboo. "It grows so quickly and so fast."
Eicholz said the invasive plant is growing through asphalt walkways and has began blocking sightlines to exhibits.
To stop the plant from taking over, Maryland lawmakers passed legislation in 2023 targeting bamboo. Now, it is up to local jurisdictions to figure out where they go from here.
"What we want to do is basically get to a starting point to say 'hey, this is a problem, we need to address it'," said Councilmember Josh Hastings. "But we're not going to do so in a way that's kind of overly harmful to the landowner."
The initial tactic the county plans on using, according to Hastings, is educating people on how to limit the spread of bamboo, or how to eliminate it all together.
"There are various mechanisms you can use from literally digging the soils up to burning it to other kind of ways for various invasive species," said Hastings. "It's costly and it's challenging but if we don't address it now it's only going to get worse and worse and worse."
Proposed county legislation would require people to take action on their own property. Doing nothing is when the county could step in, but Hastings said they want to avoid fining people.
This topic will likely be talked about in the next upcoming work session. Then it would move to legislative session, where the council would be able to create laws centered around growing and removing bamboo.