"The interesting biological phenomenon that masting of bamboo and dwarf bamboo can cause an outbreak of forest rodents has long been something of a legend," says Kajimura. Their results were published in Ecological Processes. Comparing data from before and after the masting, the researchers found an increase in the populations of both the large and small Japanese field mouse, but no similar effect was seen on Smith's voles in the same area. A team of researchers from Nagoya University led by Associate Professor Hisashi Kajimura and doctoral student Hanami Suzuki, both from the Graduate School of Bioagricultural Sciences, investigated the effects of this simultaneous seeding of dwarf bamboo on local rodent populations in Aichi Prefecture, Japan. In the 2010s, the masting of dwarf bamboo, a Sasa species with a 120-year masting cycle, began to be observed on forest floors throughout Japan. There have been previous reports of large-scale tree mortality during such events due to rodent outbreaks. This has received a lot of attention because of the agricultural and forest damage that occurs, as well as the risk of diseases spread by these rodents. Rodent outbreaks are believed to be associated with feeding on bamboo seeds in these mast years.
Plants that coordinate their flowering and fruiting in mast years do so simultaneously and over a wide area.
During such events, which occur in "mast years," some plants will produce heavy seed crops. This plant phenomenon is called masting, and the next one is not expected for more than 100 years. The large-scale flowering and seeding of dwarf bamboo is a rare event.
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