I've had a S. fastuosa 'Viridis' for around 5 years now and it has yet to establish a decent sized patch. Just a few scrawny culms though they do stay green. Meanwhile, the Phyllostachys nuda next to them has formed a big grove I have to whack back every year.

It's pretty much any plant that is propagated vegetatively; that is, new plants are made from the "parent" plant by taking cuttings, rhizomes with active culms on them, tissues that are cultured cellularly - any form of asexual reproduction from an individual plant to create genetically id...

foxd wrote:I just noticed that this month is Zombie Awareness Month.

Also Tuesday is Star Wars Day. May the Fourth be with you.

It's kind of hard to not be aware of zombies. They have a certain air about them.

Did someone say "Zombies"?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vqq_cAz_ ... r_embedded

I'll watch the videos when I have time. Do you think the Ty-Ty brothers are related to Ed Wood? Sounds possible.

If not, then those guys are on some serious psychotropic drugs, and probably were bottle fed on them as infants.

The Sasa veitchii is shooting, as are some of the Pleioblastus, but my big 'boos are playing it cool. The Phyllostachys nuda will likely send up a gazillion shoots this year as we had a mild winter, lots of snow cover and a warm and wet spring. Ka-BOING! Hoping the P. rubromarginata gets frisky too.

My P. bissetii "porpoises" a lot. Not sure if it's a Phyllostachys characteristic. I also use a lot of mulch and compost, and wonder whether that encourages this type of surface rhizome growth.

I use soiled bedding from my poultry barn and run/yard (wood shavings, chicken- and waterfowl poop) along with compost from kitchen scraps, garden prunings and leaves. When I had goats and a rabbit, their poop was the creme de la creme of ingredients too. :) Some of it is completely composted (kitch...

One thing about clumpers: You do have to calculate how much space to allow if you are planting on a boundary. Even though Fargesias are clumpers, they can make a clump with a large diameter, so give it space to allow for that or you may have to prune some culms to keep the clump from expanding under...

Robbie78 wrote:The one thing great about them is when drunk underage teenagers decide to run through my yard at 1:00 in the morning it trips them up

Bamboo rhizomes that "porpoise" appropriately can accomplish the same thing.

Ditch Witch is a handy trencher. I always see them at our regional tradeshows, and it is tempting to consider investing in one. Saves your back, but not your bucks, though! If you have 125 more feet to trench, might be worth renting.

Thanks, Brad. It's nice to be back. I've been building my gardening business and the past year was hectic; no time for yakking on discussion boards. :) It's kind of interesting that all of these F. nitidas, even though they're all clones from 19th-century seed, flower at different rates. The straigh...

You have lots of choices, but do you want running or clumping bamboo? Is the barrier for privacy (a screen), a windbreak or a physical barrier (such as to keep people/animals out or in)? Phyllostachys bissetii makes a good barrier for all of those, IME. It can take cold and wind better than a lot of...

Thanks for the replies, guys. Very interesting information. I didn't know P. japonica was a (natural) hybrid, though I'd read that Hibanobambusa traquillans 'Shiroshima' is natural hybrid of Phyllostachys nigra 'Henon' and Sasa veitchii (what a strange match up THAT is), so it appears that natural h...

After 12 years since I planted a vegetativly propagated Japanese arrow bamboo, it's flowering. I'm wondering whether this is one of those species that recovers afterward, or whether it dies?

Has anyone had their P. japonica produce flowers, and if so, viable seed?