[[GilligansIsland http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/bamboo_tech.jpg]]
[[caption-width:200:Just don't ask what one of these bad boys runs on.]]

-->''"Good thing they made everything out of balsa wood back then."''
-->-- '''Tom Servo''', ''MysteryScienceTheater3000''

BambooTechnology, named for the unlikely devices that the Professor came up with on ''GilligansIsland,'' is the use of mechanisms with a level of technology closer to the Stone Age to achieve feats usually achieved with Industrial or even Modern Age technology. In general they are not necessarily made of bamboo -- the ones on ''TheFlintstones'' were often made out of wood, stone and dinosaurs. What characterizes all of them is the self-evident unlikelihood that they actually work. Most likely to be seen in the more farcical [[SitCom sitcoms]].

BambooTechnology includes the RobinsonGoldbergContraption, but not anything that relies on magic to work. Those devices are {{Magitek}}. Pretty much sure to crop up in past-based PunkPunk settings.

To be fair, bamboo ''is'' an incredible versatile material, light, strong yet flexible, and the plant grows very quickly. But they have yet to find a way to make electronics out of it... (other than as [[http://www.google.com/patents?id=DB5VAAAAEBAJ&printsec=abstract&zoom=4&dq=bamboo filaments for light bulbs]]).
----
!!Examples

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder: Advertising ]]

*[[http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=agrKvbcQhWg This]] new ad for Emerald Nuts features a man who who has things built on him by the Swiss Family Robinson. They appear to have gotten into his living room through a [[AnotherDimension trans-dimensional portal]]... made from bamboo.
** New link please?

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Comic Books ]]

* Possible variation/subversion: When he and the rest of the Fearsome Four ([[ZombieApocalypse Zombie]] FantasticFour) were locked in a vault so the Ultimate FantasticFour could save the day, Zombie Reed Richards bragged to the guards that using highly improbable materials ("Did you know you can make a keyboard out of hair?"), he and the rest of the Fearsome Four had now built a functional teleporter and would be leaving now for Central Park where they'd gobble up whoever they came across, thank you very much and goodbye. The Fearsome Four joins hands and disappears, the [[TheGuardsMustBeCrazy guards rush in]]... and then Zombie Reed Richards tells Zombie Sue Storm she can turn off their invisibility.
**You would really think the guards would ''know'' that.
*** One IdiotBall, served up hot!
* The weakest arc in the XWingSeries comics, ''Requiem For A Rogue'', had TIE fighters and TIE Interceptors made largely of wood. Small spaceships, firing lasers. Made out of wood. Piloted by nonsentient beasts being controlled by evil Sith music. [[WallBanger Gaah!]]
** ...well, that sounds dumb at first, but [[RefugeInAudacity all of it combined...]]
* [[CalvinAndHobbes Calvin]] is able to make a [[TimeTravel time machine]], [[ShapeShifting Transmogrifier]], and [[CloningBlues Duplicator]] out of a cardboard box. He even improves on it, managing to convert a regular water pistol to a Transmogrifier.
** He can also fly to Mars on his toy-wagon.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Film ]]

* Brilliantly parodied in ''[=~Top Secret!~=]'', in a {{flashback}} in which Nigel and Hillary, after being trapped on a DesertedIsland, build numerous items actually out of bamboo, including a shopping basket and a two-car garage. They have real BambooTechnology too: the garage door opener and controller, which would require electronic equipment.
**[[RuleOfFunny No it wouldn't]].
* The most laughable moment in an already ridiculous film, MST3K alum ''CaveDwellers'' has its Prehistoria RenaissanceMan Ator launch his final assault on the EvilOverlord's castle in ''a hang-glider made out of wood and tanned leather''.
-->'''Joel''':He's probably got a tank waiting in the courtyard.
-->'''Servo''':Yeah, and it's made out of coconuts.
*In the live action ''FatAlbert'' film, Fat Albert is given a car made out of trash from the junkyard to drive his date, subverted in that it's powered by two of the Cosby kids.
* The Ewoks in ''StarWars: Return of the Jedi'' fight Imperial high-tech with bamboo tech, [[RockBeatsLaser and win]].
** They also had a Rebellion commando force (who all died by the way) and their awesome helmets with them, who likely orchestrated the majority of the fight. The Ewoks were just there to show the tragedy of war by catching blaster fire.
**This is similar to Ethiopia's defeat of Italy in 1896. An army with few modern weapons, at its core still spearmen and archers beat a European army of gunmen and cannons. So it's not as crazy as it sounds.
** This troper heard that most of the Ewoks' success was because of those tactics and the element of surprise. They took heavy casualties after the Imperials regrouped, but Lucas didn't want to change the mood by showing that. It might just be {{Fanon}}.
*** Let us not forget that the Imperials had no way of knowing that the ewoks would be there to help, and were only anticapating the small strike team. The Imperials were also using poorly armored scout vehicles.
* A made-for-TV movie version of ''SwissFamilyRobinson'' featured a fake gun made of bamboo that was used to [[WallBanger scare away the wildlife]].
** A simple gun might have made the Suspension of Disbelief (barely) possible, but the producers went balls-to-the-walls improbable with a ''[[GatlingGood Gatling gun]]'' design that fired several fruits per second. Never mind that it was never explained HOW that gun generated the pressure to propel them down the spinning barrels.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Literature ]]

* The fantasy novel ''BridgeOfBirds'' has three men in Seventh-Century China jerry-rig a primitive helicopter out of bamboo, palm tree fronds, and ''gunpowder,'' which they are able to synthesize because they are stranded on a saltpeter island [[ConvectionSchmonvection in the middle of a lake of sulfurous lava.]]
** China ''did'' have gunpowder before the West invented it, but, yeah...
* In the second ''[[UpliftTrilogy Uplift]]'' trilogy by David Brin, the inhabitants of Jijo make amazing things, such as computers, despite trying to voluntarily ''devolve'', and having discarded all their working technology to an oceanic trench. Many things, funnily enough, are made from the boo - an alien version of the plant, which is bigger and stronger - even space ''rockets''.
** Admittedly, the philosophy of devolution had somewhat petered out by the timeframe of the novels - most inhabitants of Jijo only paid lip service to the idea, and set about the usual habits of sentience in their everyday life - those habits mostly involving improving their lot. Only a few fanatics truly believed in the so-called "Path of Redemption" and forsaking intelligence.
* ''SwissFamilyRobinson''. They had a water-cooled "fridge", and a waterwheel-pumped system to deliver it.
* The ''{{Riverworld}}'' novels by Philip Jose Farmer. The entire human race is resurrected on the banks of a twenty-million-mile-long river with no tools except what they can cobble out of bamboo and fish (and the occasional human corpse). They end up making large boats, balloons, and almost-industrial societies.
** It has to be admitted, though, that the powers that be provide the resurrectees not only with food but also occasional other amenities, such as razors, cloth, soap and whatnot. The only thing definitely lacking on Riverworld is metal.
*** Book 2 of the series introduces this metal in the form of an asteroid and the conflicts that arise when various factions realize what they can do with it.
* One of the many ''{{Dragonlance}}'' books had an exiled dwarf happy he found a bunch of metal scrap. Granted, he couldn't build anything important with it. But he ''could'' build the tools which would then allow him to build important stuff.
** It's [[OurDwarvesAreAllTheSame the same]] in ''{{Discworld}}'': All a dwarf needs is fire and metal. Then he can make simple tools. And with simple tools he can make complex tools, and with complex tools a dwarf can make ''anything''.
* ''{{Missionaries}}'' trilogy by Lyubov and Yevgeny Lukin. Some guys found a portal into past (turned out to be AlternateUniverse) and tried to stop European colonization by giving would-be victims whatever technology local resources allowed, then [[LensmanArmsRace fire fed itself]], until "HeWhoFightsMonsters" result. First caravels met two military states happily blasting each other. Using [[MacrossMissileMassacre salvo launchers]], rocket planes and catamaran carriers with ethanol turbines. And total fireproofing to offset drawbacks of low-metal approach. [[CurbstompBattle For some reason]] they were ''not'' impressed when "The Great Enemy" made its long-awaited [[TheDungAges inept act of aggression]], but still had a nasty case of CultureShock:
--> ''You want to say that their ships ''burn''? -- chemist was taken aback -- That just one incendiary rocket -- and caravel...'' Not finishing the phrase, he shook his head and grew silent.
* The "Clacks" of the {{Discworld}} novels are based on real life semaphore telegraphs and seem to work much the same way - only much better. In reality the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_telegraph Chappe telegraph]] was fairly slow, easily disrupted and thanks to the cost of training and keeping operators, hideously expensive (which is why it was used by the government and army rather than merchants). The Clacks on the other hand not only work much faster and reliably than the real world version but are apparently so inexpensive to run the company that owns became fantastically rich very quickly. Then again, in fairness, they exist largely as a parody of the internet so arguably this can be excused.
** In fact, the Bamboo Technology Internet aspect even extends to transferring photos through ''binary.'' Again, over semaphores.
* In ''SoonIWillBeInvincible'', the prison holding Doctor Impossible at the beginning of the book is reluctant to let him get his hands on anything for fear of this trope. He lampshades it quietly to himself, musing that he really couldn't pull a Gilligan, but maybe if he had some copper wire...

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live Action TV ]]

* BambooTechnology was applied for humor effect in an episode of the Alton Brown cooking/science show ''GoodEats'', in which Brown is "stranded on a deserted island" but has managed to put together a suspiciously well-equipped kitchen out of found objects, wherein he demonstrates the techniques and science behind several forms of tropical cooking. (The show abounds with similar framing devices, ranging from Alton playing his own EvilTwin in an episode about kimchi to a [[CourtroomAntic Courtroom Antics]] trial of butter.)
* In ''TheMightyBoosh'' episode "Milky Joe", Howard and Vince flee from the coconut-police in a bamboo car. They also construct houses, fashion items, and the coconut men from bamboo, palm leaves, etc.
* One prominent example is ''TheATeam'', where the titular team regularly cobbled together weapons and vehicles from random ingredients, such as twenty-four feet of PVC piping, a metal dune-buggy frame and household chemicals.
* Even better is ''{{MacGyver}}'', where the entire plot revolves on the hero saving the day by fabricating something ridiculously clever from a piece of gum, a toothpick and a hairdryer (or whatever).
** One memorable sequence (perhaps the definitive one) from the opening of Legend of the Holy Rose Part 1 involves literally bamboo technology. The title character, with only a few hours, manages to design and build a whole gyroplane out of bamboo, tarps, and an old airplane engine. He and the prisoner he was rescuing then proceed to fly out of the base through heavy gunfire and have the plane work perfectly without any apparent flaws in spite of both the lack of rigidity of the materials used in it and the fact that it had to have taken at least some hits. Not exactly {{Willing Suspension Of Disbelief}}'s finest hour. Also lampshaded by his copilot saying "It really flies!" and Mac replying "Of course it does!".
***''{{Mythbusters}}'' tested out [=MacGyver=]'s bamboo glider. It didn't work — primarily because the motor (which in the ''{{MacGyver}}'' episode actually came from a ''cement mixer'', not an aircraft) wasn't strong enough. It also took them a lot longer to build.
*** This is why [=MacGyver=] is frequently called the "Patron Saint of ''{{Mythbusters}}''".
**** A man trying to flee EastGermany built an airplane out of a trabant... and ''succeeded''. You can see the airplane in the Museum of the Wall in Checkpoint Charlie, Berlin.
* Locke's Bamboo Trebuchet in ''{{Lost}}'' stretched credibility in my eyes, seeing as how his engineering knowledge was limited to working in a toy store and a box factory.
** ...which is probably why it didn't work.
*** Why he would even ''think'' it would work against a metal hatch is what I want to know.
** Michael's raft did, and the pontoons were indeed made of bamboo.
** The Frozen Donkey Wheel: It is a donkey wheel in a frozen chamber [[spoiler: underneath the Orchid station which, when pushed, ''moves the island through space '''and time''' ''.]]
*** Subverted in that the intelligence behind the island can make stuff ''not'' work if it so chooses.
* In the ''StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "The City on the Edge of Forever'' Spock manages to make a processor interface for his tricorder out of, as he puts it, "stone knives and bearskins". Although this is {{Handwave}}d as due to his genius and future knowledge, it is completely impossible to construct such a thing out of the few vacuum tubes and other items they have.
** Good thing a ''23rd Century tricorder'' was part of the device, then. Given that its parts were the main components he used.
*** Irrelevant. You can't do anything with those parts, not even add 2+2.
** Subverted in an episode of ''StarTrekVoyager''; Janeway and a holographic version of Leonardo da Vinci managed to escape some ruthless aliens using a Renaissance-era glider they had previously failed to successfully launch. The subversion: the new glider was improved upon using future materials, and the aforementioned aliens had already pressed the hologram into creating future tech for them for a while by then, giving a bit more credibility to how it managed to work.
* StarTrek TOS ''Arena'' has the {{Metron}} Master Race setting Kirk to fight his (Reptiloid) ''Gorn'' counterpart on a desert planet for which they will use their god-like powers to allow control over that region of the galaxy to the winner's species. Having discovered that dropping an almighty rock from a great height onto the Gorn has no effect, Kirk makes a hand-cannon out of coal, sulphur, something nitrogeneous and what appears to be a hollow tree-trunk to shoot him/her/it with the local fist-sized diamonds. They bounce off but not without knocking the Gorn captain down, whom Kirk honourably allows to retire in defeat, for which the {{Metrons}} (our demi-gods) award the human race extra Brownie points.
*''ShroudOfTheThwacker'' by Chris Elliott, a historical fiction spoof set in the 19th century, features wooden mobile phones that run on kerosene.
* The British television show ''Rough Science'' is essentially this trope applied to reality TV. Five scientists are dropped off in the middle of the wilderness and must use natural materials and a small amount of scrap material to make advanced devices within a time limit. They've constructed everything from radio transmitters and receivers, weather stations and clocks, to a wide variety of medicines and even microscopes and bacterial cultures, all using scrap and natural materials.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Newspaper Comics ]]

* The Stone Age characters in Johnny Hart's ''[[{{BC}} B.C.]]'' often utilized this.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Professional Wrestling ]]

* The Punjabi Prison match between Batista and the Big Show. If that isn't bamboo technology I don't know what is.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Video Games ]]

* ''{{Bioshock}}'', in a SteamPunk setting with no computers in the vein of modern technology, has ''intelligent defense turrets''. To steal a joke from ''[[ZeroPunctuation]]'', this editor was unaware that boiled water could form allegiances.
** Of course, Underwater-Objectivist-Art-Deco-City-1960 is not quite as Bamboo Technology as most steampunk.
** And boiled water can form allegiances in the same way that electricity does.
** It would have to unreasonably huge though to have that kind of sophisticated AI. The joke is technically incorrect though.
** Bioshock's robots are only "steam-powered" in that all of Bioshock's electricity is ultimately generated by steam turbines, just like the electricity most of us use. Bioshock's machines are very definitely electrically powered, though, so the whole "steampunk" thing is a terrible misnomer.
* In an almost perfect example of this trope, Princess Kaguya in ''{{Okami}}'' returns to the moon on a ''space shuttle made of bamboo'' while wearing an ancient Japanese spacesuit.
* In ''[[DonkeyKongCountry Donkey Kong 64]]'' (and also ''{{Super Smash Bros}}. Brawl''), Diddy Kong has [[JetPack rocket boosters]] and a gun, made out of wood. How the rocket doesn't ignite the wood is ignored.
** Not to mention the fact that the frigging gun shoots ''peanuts.''
*** Really, all of the Kongs' bullets can be included. Other than peanuts, we also see coconuts, grapes, pineapples, and feathers used as ammunition.
** If Masahiro Sakurai helmed TV Tropes, this trope would have been called "Jungle Technology" as per the Smash Dojo (In other news, Sakurai lampshaded this trope with those two words while showing Diddy's moves on the Dojo during the long lead-up to ''Brawl'''s release).
* The dwarves in ''DwarfFortress'' are able to raise huge steel bridges using nothing more than three rocks. One for the lever, and two to connect the lever to the bridge.
** It is actually possible to build a primitive ''computer'' in DwarfFortress. This is a game in which "gears made from rock" are advanced technology. Slight subversion, because it's the player, not the [[MemeticMutation dorfs]], who can perform the computations.
** Although, ironically, they can't perform the literature-alluded reference above of going from raw materials to full smelting operations because the anvil can only be created by a metalsmith forge which requires, you guessed it, an anvil. Cue much squabbling over the forums about the possibilities of a crude rock-based anvil to bootstrap their way up. (Which logically must have been done at some point, because where did the very first dwarfish anvil come from?)
*** Granite anvils were commonly used prior to steel and iron, and still work just fine. This troper uses one for some spare-time knife-making.
* Subverted in the case of Huitzil/Phobos of ''{{Darkstalkers}}/Vampire'' fame, who appears to belong to some Mayan TempleOfDoom, but was actually created by BigBad Pyron to [[CrushKillDestroy destroy all life on Earth]] (starting with the dinosaurs).
* ''Touhou'': while it's not really technology, the inhabitants of Gensokyo recently constructed a moon rocket to visit the Lunar Capital in the ''Silent Sinner in Blue'' official manga. It had normal windows that could be opened from the inside while in-flight, a chimney, artificial gravity and air, somehow, and was constructed mostly of wood.
* ''SuperMarioBrothers'' 3. Bowser had a whole tank division, a navy and an air fleet all made of wood.
* Taz-Mania's Francis X. Bushman had a "tree trunk tank".
* In Katamari Damashi the Prince must make stars out of eclectic junk.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Webcomics ]]

* [[http://joshlesnick.com/wendy/?comic=45 This]] parody by webcomic ''{{Webcomics/Wendy}}''.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]

* ''KidsNextDoor'' has its own self-parodying version, 2x4 technology, where scrap lumber and household/everyday items are cobbled together into everything from firearms to spaceships.
** Not to mention HumongousMecha made from everything from metal to lawn chairs to ''cats''.
* In a ''VeggieTales'' parody of Gilligan's Island called "Larry's Lagoon", the professor gets everyone off the island by building a helicopter out of bamboo and coconuts.
* Edd from ''EdEddNEddy'' has been building pretty much anything with cardboard and miscellaneous junk long before the KND. And we mean anything. Framework for a prototype rocketship? Yep. Go-kart? You betcha. Airplane? But of course! A miniature portable gumball machine that grants wishes, spoken or unspoken, via prodigious use of hammerspace? You shouldn't be surprised by now. Unfortunately, his inventions usually get destroyed [[StatusQuoIsGod by the end of the episode]] due to interference or malfunctions.
** The fact that Edd's house is walking distance from an abandoned construction site makes it a little bit more plausible. Still doesn't explain how he made an airplane without leaving school grounds.
* In ''JimmyNeutron: Boy Genius'', Jimmy manages to build rocket ships out of rides in an amusement park. There are probably a lot of his inventions that would fit this.
** He actually builds two treehouses with functioning plumbing systems out of bamboo at one point.
** Heck, once when stranded in the past he built a ''time machine'' out of nuts, berries, rocks and wood.
*** In a cave, with A BOX OF SCRAPS.
* Gadget, the [[WrenchWench inventor mousette]] from ''[[ChipAndDaleRescueRangers Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers]]'' constructs her inventions, ranging from weapons to vehicles (even a starship of sorts) to home appliances, exclusively from garbage found in dumpsters or even right on site.
* Ogg, the boy genius inventor from CartoonNetwork's ''[[MikeLuAndOgg Mike, Lu, & Ogg]]'', can build just about any invention from the materials he finds on the show's no-tech Pacific island setting, including on one memorable occasion a ''television set''. (Of course it doesn't work because there are no stations on the island, but all the islanders become addicted to watching static...)
* This was parodied several times in ''DaveTheBarbarian'' ("and then, Dave made an improvised megaphone by using a squirrel, some strings and a megaphone!")
* On an episode of ''{{Futurama}}'', [[RobotBuddy Bender]] gets a downgrade so that he is made out of wood. Naturally, it turns out that it was AllJustADream.
** Along with that, he and the other inhabitants of the Island of Obsolete Robots build a submarine entirely out of wood. In a nod to realism, it isn't terribly water-tight.
* In "Stratosphere", the ''StormHawks'' build space suits, transform the Condor into a rocket ship that can fly to the Stratosphere and modify Aerrow's skimmer so that it can fly to the Exosphere, where no one has ever gone before. How exactly they manage to do all that remains a mystery.
* Parodied in ''TheSimpsons'' episode "Das Bus" (which was essentially ''LordOfTheFlies'' meets ''GilligansIsland'') where Bart instructs Martin to work on building "some coconut walky-talkys. And, if possible, a coconut Nintendo system". He also envisions the children building a society based on BambooTechnology and [[EverythingsBetterWithMonkeys monkey butlers]].Needless to say, it doesn't ''quite'' work out (not least because the island lacks any bamboo).
* ''{{Freakazoid}}'' had a good laugh at this when Freakazoid was trapped in a bamboo cage...but he couldn't break through it with his super-strength because it was "''molecular'' bamboo."
* The young rodents in ''OnceUponAForest'' build a flying machine called the "Flapper-wingamathing" out of mainly sticks and leaves and such.
* Kowalski from ''ThePenguinsOfMadagascar'' has inventions made from household items, including {{Stat-O-Vision}} binoculars made from paper cups and a mind-switching machine powered by a 17-speed blender. Amazingly, they seem to work properly half of the time.
* An episode of DuckTales features the gang escaping from a frozen wasteland by building a plane out of ''ice''.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Real Life ]]

* Real Life example: The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamboo_Organ Las Piñas Bamboo Organ]] in Las Piñas City, The Philippines.
* [[http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/09/growing-bamboo.html Real Life example: A bike made of bamboo.]]
* Not exactly bamboo, but knowing that the DeHavilland Mosquito fighter plane is actually made of wood was pretty surprising to this troper. Mostly because by World War II, nearly all planes of that level of effectiveness and production were made of metal.
** Even more famously, Howard Hughes' [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes_H-4_Hercules "Spruce Goose"]], which was actually made of birch.
** And then there's the Russian Yak series of fighter aircraft, which made extensive use of wood in its construction. Despite what one may think, wood still had many advantages for aircraft construction: it was cheap, plentiful, easy to work and lighter than most metals.
* See Cargo Cults. Though in this case, the technology didn't actually work.
* Several Asian countries use bamboo plumbing.
*It is well known that several Asian countries also use bamboo in place of steel rebar for construction of large buildings
*Not a true example, but a particular branding of Wacom tablets is "Bamboo".
* Located in Peru on lake Titicaca, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uros Uros]] is a floating city made ''entirely'' out of ''woven reeds''.
----
<<|AppliedPhlebotinum|>>