Sept 28-29, 2012 - American Bamboo Society 2012 Annual Conference, Austin, Texas Darwin Nelson Darwin B. Nelson, Ph. D. Consulting Environmental Psychologist Four generations of the Nelson family have grown bamboo over the last four decades.  Darwin has been working on a book which focusing on his experiences with bamboo farming in Texas.  The business is a family farm and an internet nursery, providing consulting services related to the selection of bamboos for specific sites and purposes.  Like most Texas farmers the goal is to pay for the family farm and produce an income that allows one to live among the plants that we love.  Bamboos are ancient grasses and they are among the most valuable and environmentally beneficial plants in the world. Bamboos provide food, shelter, timber and beauty. Bamboos develop live fences, privacy hedges and giant windbreaks. They grow more rapidly than trees, produce more oxygen, stop erosion, enrich and loosen the soil and provide protection from hurricanes and gulf storms. Fresh bamboo shoots are a major food source for the worldʼs people and bamboo timber is a renewable and sustainable source of wood.  We encourage and support large scale agricultural and industrial plantings of bamboo. Our family began the first bamboo farm in Texas and has been involved in the first plantings of bamboos for the phytoremediation and revegetation of industrial waste sites. We are involved as consultants to a 1000 acre planting in Central Texas.  Bamboos provide shade and most Texans can appreciate cooler air in the summer and evergreen foliage in the winter.  We will be opening the farm in Houston this fall and we have significant groves on the San Marcos River and Bayside.  Darwin Nelson is now a full time bamboo farmer so he is happy.  bambootexas.com Vitae Darwin B. Nelson, Ph. D. Consulting Environmental Psychologist Current Actvities Bamboo Consultant: Savannah Project: 1000 acre planting of bamboo and trees to create a drive through exotic game ranch and zoo. Austin, Texas Principal: BambooTexas. com: Own and operate a six acre bamboo farm and internet nursery, Houston, Texas.  Supply rare ornamental bamboos for landscapers, home owners, public gardens and arboretums. Operate and maintain an experimental Tropical Bamboo Garden at Bayside, Texas that was initially planted in 2001 to test tissue culture and selected bamboos appropriate for biomass and phytoremediation projects in South Texas. Supply selected bamboos for environmental engineering Mirm involved in the revegetation and phytoremediation of industrial waste sites. Author: Bamboos: Protection and Beauty for the Texas Gulf Coast. Chapter for area gardening reference book published by the Corpus Christi Garden Council. Texas Bamboos with John Nelson (Available September 2012) Relevant Experience Began collecting and studying bamboo in 1975 and established the Mirst Bamboo Farm in Texas (Nueces River Groves).  Original member of the Texas Bamboo Society (1991). Established (with John and Wendy Nelson) the Mirst internet bamboo nursery in Texas (BambooTexas.Com) to provide rare bamboos to landscapers and homeowners. Collaborated with Dr. Ding Xingcui of the China National Bamboo Research Center to complete site evaluation for 10,000‐acre plantings in South Texas (2002).  Designed and implemented Mirst beautiMication, revegetation, and phytoremediation projects at industrial work sites in Texas (TOR Minerals, ALCOA, and Sherwin Alumina) Curator of Bamboos, Texas State Museum of Asian Cultures.  Developed and maintain an extensive private collection of bamboo species appropriate for planting inTexas.  Established signiMicant bamboo plantings in Texas (50 acres) that can be used as propagation stock for large‐scale biomass plantings.