Uncle Tom’s Cabin vocabulary

a thicket of any of a variety of Arundinaria grasses: A. gigantea, A. tecta and A. appalachiana. As a bamboo, these giant grasses grow in thickets up to 24 ft tall. A. gigantea is generally found in stream valleys and ravines throughout the southeastern US. A. tecta is a smaller stature species found on the Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plains. Finally, A. appalachiana is found in more upland areas at the southern end of the Appalachian mountains.

Canebrakes were formerly widespread in the Southern United States but have been widely replaced by agriculture. Concomitant with this destruction have been challenges to the survival of the Florida panther (Puma concolor subsp. coryi) and Bachman's warbler (Vermivora bachmanii), the latter of which is critically endangered and may in fact be extinct. [...]