Chusquea culeou sheath removal

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Oregonbamboo
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Chusquea culeou sheath removal

Post by Oregonbamboo »

How cool is this?

From Phil Comer at Halfside Bamboo in Shelton, Washington:
Image
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Re: Chusquea culeou sheath removal

Post by Roy »

[quote="oregonbamboo"]How cool is this?

From Phil Comer at Halfside Bamboo in Shelton, Washington:
quote]



Beautiful! Even to a tropical guy.
:wav:
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Post by rfgpitt »

I saw Phil was here last night and it looks like he posted a different pic of it in the database. Very cool.
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Post by Iowaboo »

The colors remind me of christmas.

Way out of this world psychedelic complexion, dude :!:





8)
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Post by BooKing »

Truly spectacular.
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Post by David »

Very cool 8) Looks like they went to the beach with no sunscreen. Let's see will this Chusquea grow in Tennessee? Let me check.........NO :!: , summers to hot :(
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Post by Oregonbamboo »

Phil's plant is very impressive. I killed the first chuquea we bought a few years ago. A very expensive five gallon that expired the first summer in a 100 degree heat wave no matter how much water I gave it. :oops:

It really pissed me off and I told myself "never again..."

I'm having second thoughts now. OK I admit to ordering another one from Phil after seeing this image. :lol:
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Post by foxd »

My experience has been that Chusquea culeou does not like hot weather. I had one that I bought in December that looked beautiful up until August and then died in a matter of days when it got too hot.
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Post by needmore »

Thought I'd remind folks not to peel off the culm leaves until that portion of the culm has fully elongated no matter how pretty it may be, that is a method of forcing bonsai culms - to peel the leaves off early.
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Post by Roy »

needmore wrote:Thought I'd remind folks not to peel off the culm leaves until that portion of the culm has fully elongated no matter how pretty it may be, that is a method of forcing bonsai culms - to peel the leaves off early.
Brad,

Now you've let the cat out of the culm bag. Now they will be out there peeling the sheaths off as soon as they come out of the ground. The process can lead to some unusual effects on the distance between nodes.
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Re: Chusquea culeou sheath removal

Post by stevelau1911 »

I really enjoyed the idea of sheath removal in reducing the height of a bamboo because it works up to a certain extent because the nodes stop elongating without their protective sheath. Aesthetically, it results in a more compact culm since the height from the ground to branches can be reduced to half or less than what it would have been.

I believe that this can easily be taken a step farther by forcing bends with malleable tape wire that can hold a culm in a position. The tricky part about this is that a node only becomes flexible for a limited amount of time, and needs to be continually adjusted as the shoot grows, maybe even several times per day. This could result in an amazing S shape, twirl, or whatever shape you want. The branches may also be pruned or wired to have a certain shape while they still haven't hardened yet.

I'm not sure where I would be able to find wire strong enough to bend a culm, but this could result in a pretty cool looking culm. Bring it out of the grove and it could become a nice plant used for bonsai.

Here's what I mean.
Image
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Re: Chusquea culeou sheath removal

Post by Nicholas »

Steve, maybe one could use pvc plumbing (bent segments) and guide the shoot through it ?
I suppose one could cut pipes in half and attach clamps for easier removal (rather than cutting them apart once the culm has hardened)
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Re: Chusquea culeou sheath removal

Post by stevelau1911 »

I've actually attempted this last spring however there seems to be a limit on how far the shoot can bend without the threat of snapping, and without something to hold the entire rising shoot a certain way, it will tend to aim upwards and straighten out as much as it can. It can be tricky to know when the best time is to remove sheaths.

I think wires, clamps, pieces of pipes may all be necessary to get an authentic looking bamboo bonsai. Another thing to take in consideration is that the soft tissue on the emerging shoot is pretty easy to scratch up, ruing the aesthetic value of the culm.

Here's what I had with atrovaginata. I couldn't get the snaky bend I was looking for.
Image
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Re: Chusquea culeou sheath removal

Post by Nicholas »

Interesting look.

I seem to always pull off some of the outer culm tissue when removing sheaths leaving scars. Do you actually cut them off with something sharp (i.e. razor or carpet knife) or just carefully remove them by hand?

I've been thinking about what were to happen if a shoot was guided back into the ground at a later stage in development. Would the shoot tip revert back to a rhizome?
Hence the thought of using piping to guide the tip back down into the ground (have a u shape on top of a pipe segment and place that over a shoot). I think if you let a culm grow into some guiding pipes it would retain that shape similarly to how you can make square culms using rectangular pieces of metal.

I might experiment a bit with this this year
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Re: Chusquea culeou sheath removal

Post by stevelau1911 »

In this experiment, I just peeled them off by hand. I don't think you can revert a normal shoot back into becoming a rhizome, but it is possible with some whip shoots.

As far as turning shoots into a square or triangular shape, I believe the culm must be at least a certain diameter so that it is hollow enough to be shaped.

One part I like about this is that it does seem possible to reduce the height of the culm. It basically means if you have a 40ft culm, you can effectively reduce it down to 20ft in height to fit under a large greenhouse.
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