FAQ

Bamboo Sizes

Displaying the size of the bamboo can be confusing, there are two sizes to be aware of, the size we deliver to you, and the size the bamboo grows to. The size shown by the ‘Add to basket’ button, is the size we deliver to you.
The ‘other’ height, is the bamboo’s potential height, this is shown in the bamboo description. But bear in mind all bamboo can be happily pruned to any height from around 2 metres upwards.

Pot Sizes

Nearly all our bamboo are potted in 18 litre pots. To most people this means very little, and doesn’t help at all in visualizing the actual pot you will receive. To give you a better idea, an 18 litre pot is slightly smaller than a bucket, and measures around 28cm tall and wide. This big pot size allows us to send you a very mature, bushy bamboo with lots of canes!

Mixing bamboo

it’s a common question as whether it’s a good idea to mix bamboo and in general it’s not.

In essence what’s not to like, creating interest using alternating species offer interesting colour variations, or blocks of colour to break up a long continuous screen. But over time, unless each bamboo species is planted within a root barrier, the eventual spread will see these colours merge and dilute each other, and look fairly untidy – not the desired outcome.

Also, there is the issue of competition, different species will grow with different vigour and this will create an unhealthy competition for light, water and nutrients. Differing growing habits will also generally result in a fairly uneven, non-uniformed screen.

Call me boring, but I do like to see a screen of bamboo nicely uniformed with a consistent and tidy form with each plant within working together rather than competing against it’s neighbour. Of course this has a lot to do with personal preference, but if mixing bamboo is for you be sure to contain each variety for best results.

How tall and how fast?

Well this is a very common question and it’s hard to answer with any real accuracy.

For any plant it’s remarkable the difference in growth rate of a happy plant, with correct light levels and access to the required nutrients and water and a plant defficient in any one of those three key ingredients.

A bamboo happily planted in the ground, as a rule of thumb will gain 1/3 of its existing height in a season. So for a 3m bamboo you can expect 1m of new height in that season.

Now of course this varies from different types of bamboo but this would generally apply to Bisset Bamboo, Yellow Groove Bamboo, Golden Bamboo, and Golden Crooskstem Bamboo.

Other varieties especially Fargesia varieties, even happy and content will grow at a much slower rate.

The growth rate for potted bamboo is also less vigorous. But regular watering and feeding and a nice big pot to grow in will certainly make a big difference.

Bamboo fertiliser

Feeding your potted bamboo is very important to keep your bamboo growing with vigour.

Feeding bamboo planted in the ground is less essential but if applied it will certainly give your bamboo a welcome boost.

Liquid fertiliser applied at regular intervals is the most common approach.

High nitrogen fertilisers are the best to use for bamboo, commonly lawn feeds are high nitrogen so will do the job very well.

Organic fertilisers such as cow manure or chicken poo are very good for bamboo because again they are high in nitrogen.

Slow release fertilisers work to sustain a potted bamboo for the growing season but for extra vigour we would recommend a liquid fertiliser too.

Planters

Bamboo are perfectly suited to being planted out in pots/planters. The planter material is not important although probably best to avoid terracotta. Any plastic, resin, stone, wooden, steel, zinc planters will do the job. 

It is important to select the correct size planter to give the bamboo room to grow. Choose too small and you will find yourself re-potting within a year or two. With bamboo generally speaking your planter cannot be too large.

The size and shape of the planter will depend on what you are looking to achieve:

For screening

There are two approaches for screening in planters, firstly using multiple troughs,  spaced along the span you wish to screen. A good size trough for our tall bamboo is 1m x 45cm x 45cm (length x width x height). Two of our bamboo will fill a trough with these dimensions quite nicely.

A second alternative is to get creative and build a continuous planter, timber, decking or sleepers are commonly used for this. This over a long span will be more economical and will give you the freedom to define your own dimensions. If you do take this approach be sure to allow your planter to drain by drilling holes in the base.

Standalone
For shorter spans or for single planters most planters will be appropriate, shape is not important neither is material. Again for using our tall bamboo look for a minimum size of 45cm tall and wide.

Care
Watering is the key to any bamboo or in fact any tree or shrub living in a planter. Bamboo must be kept moist in dry warm weather. In the warmer months this can mean watering daily which is very much what we do to keep our bamboo healthy and vigorous. Our bamboo is always kept moist and well fertilised throughout the Spring Summer and Autumn. 
Nutrition is the other important element to keeping bamboo in planters healthy. Each order we send out contains our complimentary fertiliser which will sustain your bamboo for that growing season. The following year you will need to repeat this application of slow release fertiliser or start applying a liquid nitrogen feed every 3-4 months throughout Spring, Summer, and Autumn.