we bought seven varieties of clumping bamboo from "bountiful earth" bamboo in new symrna beach, fl. all were very healthy and producing alot of new canes. the owner, chuck is very knowledgable about what he is selling as far as hardiness, size, ect. he has a web site. hope this helps, very happy with ours!

Another question. We took out a big areca palm that was near the pool and pump equipment, because we were concerned that the root ball was doing damage to the pool deck. However, we sure miss the shade for that side of the house. Could we put in a bamboo there, or would we have the same issue of a large rootball?

My house faces north, my patio and master bedroom are on the west side of my property (hot), and my neighbors house is set further back on the lot than mine so we wanted privacy and shade QUICKLY, look half way down this post, best thing I ever did.

Tom

And I guess it's time for an update, after all, that post was three years ago....

Sorry for the fuzzy picture of Cathy's orchids but if I didn't include them it would be polite so say I'd be remiss....

Tom

Wow, Tom! Pretty impressive. Any problems with keeping it on your property? Have you "harvested" any of it for other use?

that is so cool! hope ours gets like that! couple of the ones we put way out back our suppose to have six to eight inch canes and go fifty foot. love the barrier you created!

Flgardenmom,

Bamboo gets a bad reputation due to it's different growth habits. Bamboo is like children, you have the hyper hellions that run all over and won't behave. Then you have the good quiet children that stay in their seats and make the teachers life easy.....there really is that much of a difference between the running and clumping bamboo. The clumpers will stay where you put them and will simply send up new culms from around the base.

You can completely control the clumping bamboo, Lets say you have your clump of bamboo and you decide you want it to stay in a washtub size circle....no problem. If a culm comes up a few inches outside your boundary all that it takes to stop that culm so it NEVER grows again is about 6 ounces of side pressure when it is a few inches tall. The newly emerging culm snaps off and will never regrow. As a plus you could even eat that piece you snapped off if you were so inclined, though not all of them are good to eat. With clumpers if you want to limit them to say 10 culms you can....the plant is just very easy.

Mostly it depends on what height you want as to variety. It is hard to beat Multiplex either in it's green form or it's yellow form. It grows fast, tops out at about 20 feet but can be hedged off at any height. It is a tight clumping bamboo and once it fills in you can trim the lower leaves so all you will see is the culms (stems) it is not a huge culmed bamboo, quarter size is about the max but the culms make good garden stakes and are pretty. I have several hundred feet of the green multiplex growing between the neighbor and I........like you on very good terms but it assures privacy. It has been a multi year project that started with just 4 green and 1 yellow multiplex. I harvested divisions from the plants as they grew and spaced them 5 feet apart and now have 100's. On the opposite side of the property toward the other neighbor I have just started and in the last two weeks have put in 75 new multiplex.

Two years after planting if given sun water and some fert it will block a lot of your view to 6 feet or so.....by 4 years it will block the view to whatever height you determine you want.

When the culm comes out of the ground it is as thick as it will EVER be. The culm will grow up and say hits 10 feet.it will NEVER get any taller. So if you hedge it off at 8 feet you never have to retrim that culm.

What Tom is showing is the way bamboo grows but in his case he is using a large type bamboo. I used a smaller form as a barrier as I did not want the tops to intrude on to the neighbors side too much. While the base of the culm stays where it is supposed to be the tops do form a canopy and the taller they get the more they arch. If you hedge them the tops will stay on your side as well.

If it will help I can take some pictures.

Pictures would be great. I've planted some Italian Cypress for the spot when we first moved in and everything I read since, makes me regret it. Because 10-12' high would be plenty. So, maybe this is what we need to do.

Wow, Tom! Pretty impressive. Any problems with keeping it on your property? Have you "harvested" any of it for other use?

It definitely has some maintenance to it. I have to trim it 3-4 times a year, see my responses to trimming in the first link I posted. Our back porch was so hot in the summer that I didn't spend much time out there, so we wanted a fairly tall bamboo...also, I designed WHERE the hedge stopped such that in the afternoon it shades half the pool but leaves half sunny, something that would not have been possible with a shorter variety. BUT, BR is right, as a privacy hedge only, a much shorter, more manageable bamboo would be ideal, and BR is certainly the person to give you advice on good selections of bamboo.

I don't use it as I cut it down but several neighbors have taken big stalks to do various things with....

Tom

that is so cool! hope ours gets like that! couple of the ones we put way out back our suppose to have six to eight inch canes and go fifty foot. love the barrier you created!

Thanks Mark, funny you liking something I've done, I always drool over your pictures and what you've done ;-)

Tom

thanks for following up. really cool.

thanks.....people like you are why i stay posting....mark

Bamboo rabbit, what type did you use? I think I recall it was Alponse Karr? Could you show a picture?

Also, is too late to fertiize?

sorry I forgot the pictures......I will take them this morning. For the privacy hedge I used a combination of the normal green multiplex and it's sport the yellow culmed Alphonse karr. The only problem with that is the normal green multiplex is more robust and tends to shade out it's slightly slower growing yellow neighbor. On the other side of the property I have fixed that mistake and instead of planting 4 green multiplex then a yellow and repeating I planted 30 yellow Karrs then 30 greens so it will be in blocks.

No it isn't too late. My blueberries still get one more shot of fertilizer today. The multiplex is very good hardy anyway but new growth can get nipped so I would not fertilize after the middle of October. My multiplex are still putting out new culms.

Here is what the multiplex looked like at planting spring of 2009. This is a bare root single culm cut out of the ground with some roots. Purchased potted plants would take off even faster and if no divisions are taken from them even faster growth will occur.

This is fall of 2010

and today

Bear in mind I was cutting some culms out to make more divisions.

This is a shot up the fence line spring 2010

Those culms are now 10 feet tall.

This is a shot from this morning of the newly planted line of Alphonse Karr. They were planted as bareroot....they did not come from the pots, the pots are there as a temporary measure to act as a backstop for the watering system so more water falls right on the roots. The tops have been severely pruned to balance top with bottom.

and the newly planted multiplex...combined it is 300 or so feet of newly planted divisions. I as a rule do that in the spring but had surgery so it was delayed but they appear to be doing well.

This is a Kanahpaha bamboo it is a much larger type but put in to show the growth. The first picture is last fall. Second picture is today. I did trim all the low growth and removed all the first years culms. In the first picture that low green growth is what it did the first year which I have now removed, that is as tall as the culms got.

The tall unleafed culms in the first pic are the bushy green growth you see in the second picture. There are several more culms still growing up and some that just broke ground.

So, to start a new plant, you just dig up a culm and replant?

On the clumping type yes but digging up is not as easy as it sounds:) The roots are large and fibrous....I use a reciprocating saw with a 12 inch blade and cut all the way around the target culm. Cut the top way back and keep them watered daily for the first week or two. I achieve about a 90% success rate with the multiplex. I started with just 4 green and 1 yellow and now have hundreds.

Thank you so much for the photos. Its very intriguing. I did end up putting in one Alphonse Karr last summer. Had some problems with watering not happening when I was on vacation. But its recovering this year.

The key is water...if you can mulch them they will love that. They are just a grass, they like fertilizer as well.