Planting Bamboo

Bamboo is a great material for various crafts. I think we all know that. I was wondering, though, if planting some has any sort of danger of them becoming an annoying invasive species. My brother-in-law’s father had planted some years ago, and it seems to continually grow without becoming a pest. Of course, I don’t know enough about specific types of bamboo, and maybe some are better than others. Anyone know better?

Bamboo is impossible to weed out, so it is important to be careful where you plant it. It has the advantage that you can cut off the stalk and it will simply grow back. No replanting necessary. I am also seriously considering it for roofing material. If you split them and pile them right it should be relatively easy water proofing.

Not to hijack the thread or anything, but I was also wondering something. For a lot of the fun stuff I would like to be able to use bamboo or river cane the stalks have to be as perfectly straight as possible. I was wondering if tying a batch of them together as they grew might effectively make them all grow straight? I know people sometimes make them grow in all kinds of weird ways, so I was wondering it anyone had experience making them grow straight?

  • Benjamin Shender
I was wondering if tying a batch of them together as they grew might effectively make them all grow straight?

I hope that works, since the main thing I was thinking of planting them for is arrows and bow-backing material. Straightening them for arrows wouldn’t be too hard if they didn’t grow quite straight, though.

I suppose it would depend on how straight you would need to make it. I can only assume that river cane and bamboo would be similar as far as straightening goes. Making river cane straight is a fairly maddening experience involving sticking it in the fire repeatedly until it softens, and then bending straight. You have to repeat this quite a bit and they do have the tendency to break if bent too hard or allowed to cool too much. But then again, I did this for making blow guns with them, so it had to be very straight for the dart to go where you would wish it to. I suppose if it didn’t have to be completely straight the process would be a little less maddening!

Well, you might as well try. I think you’d have plenty of time as the bamboo grows to observe how different tactics yield different results, and you could adjust your methods as necessary.

you might want to look into Arundinaria gigantea, which is native to N America. it’ll grow as far north as parts of OH & PA, not sure about farther north tho’.

DONT GROW SPREADING TYPES! Research as much as you need to be sure you have a clumping type. Spreading bamboo can be one of the worst weeds on the planet, while clumping ones stay about 6-10 ft. from the original. As far as ai know, the only way to get rid of them is to “mow” it repeatedly until the root dies of starvation.

You can grow the spreading varieties a number of ways without problems.The easiest would be a container.Or you dig out a bed and line it with a plastic bamboo liner,making sure all the seams are tight.I have a friend who planted one of his spreading varieties on a hill.Whenever he sees a new rhizome shooting out the side of the hill he cuts it back.Another friend just planted his into the ground and he looks for new rhizomes and cuts them back.