Which Is the Fastest-Growing Plant?

Some species of bamboo — particularly Phyllostachys bambusoides — can grow at rates of up to 91 cm per day under ideal conditions, making bamboo the fastest-growing plant on Earth. Bamboo is technically a grass, not a tree, and achieves its extraordinary speed because all cells along the shoot elongate simultaneously. Giant kelp, a marine alga, can also grow up to 60 cm per day. By contrast, the slowest-growing tree, the white cedar (Thuja occidentalis), may grow only 10 cm in a century.