Bamboo looking dead
 

My Black Bamboo in a pot is looking decidedly like an Ex Bamboo after
this winter. Shall I leave it and will it shoot from below or are they
not hardy enough to stand that sort of winter?

Bamboo looking dead
 

On 08/03/2011 15:33, Bookworm wrote:
My Black Bamboo in a pot is looking decidedly like an Ex Bamboo after
this winter. Shall I leave it and will it shoot from below or are they
not hardy enough to stand that sort of winter?

Leave it, but make sure it is well watered. If it dries out (frozen
soil + cold winds) that could explain what has happened. It might still
shoot.

--

Jeff

Bamboo looking dead
 

On Tue, 08 Mar 2011 16:15:04 +0000, Jeff Layman wrote:

On 08/03/2011 15:33, Bookworm wrote:
My Black Bamboo in a pot is looking decidedly like an Ex Bamboo after
this winter. Shall I leave it and will it shoot from below or are they
not hardy enough to stand that sort of winter?

Leave it, but make sure it is well watered. If it dries out (frozen
soil + cold winds) that could explain what has happened. It might still
shoot.

But will it leave? :-)
--
Phil Cook

Bamboo looking dead
 

On Tue, 8 Mar 2011 07:33:01 -0800 (PST), Bookworm
wrote:

My Black Bamboo in a pot is looking decidedly like an Ex Bamboo after
this winter. Shall I leave it and will it shoot from below or are they
not hardy enough to stand that sort of winter?

Did it flower last year? If so it may well be dead. That's what they
do. That's what happened to mine, in the ground, a few years ago.

Pam in Bristol

These temps are most likely to be survived if the plant is in the ground, not in a pot, which can freeze right through. But it is normal for black bamboo to defoliate even in an average winter in many parts of Britain. But don't expect much releafing action until midsummer - they are late to put out new leaves.

The reality is that black bamboo isn't a very a suitable subject for pot cultivation. You can keep it alive, but it's a lot of work. And keeping it moist but not waterlogged is difficult in icy weather. Put it in the ground and you can almost ignore it - it wouldn't mind a bit of water in a very dry spell though.

Yours would have been Fargesia nitida, which some unscrupulous dealers sold as "black bamboo". True black bamboo, Phyllostachys nigra, has not flowered recently, and is not flowering - (though you can get a bit of sporadic flowering on most kinds of bamboo if stressed, but that shouldn't kill the whole clump.)