Life span of bamboo?
 

I've seen some edging at B&Q made out of bamboo.
How long does it take for bamboo to rot?

Draven wrote:
I've seen some edging at B&Q made out of bamboo.
How long does it take for bamboo to rot?

Same as any other thin piece of wood, I'm afraid.

--
Mike.

Draven wrote:

I've seen some edging at B&Q made out of bamboo.
How long does it take for bamboo to rot?

It goes brittle fairly rapidly, but it doesn't rot in quite the same way
as wood if it is a tropical bamboo in a temperate climate. I'd hazard a
guess that for a given diameter of bamboo pole it outlasts wood by 2-3x.
Provided you don't shatter it.

NB in tropical climates there are fungi specific to bamboo.

Regards,
Martin Brown

In article ,
Martin Brown wrote:
Draven wrote:

I've seen some edging at B&Q made out of bamboo.
How long does it take for bamboo to rot?

It goes brittle fairly rapidly, but it doesn't rot in quite the same way
as wood if it is a tropical bamboo in a temperate climate. I'd hazard a
guess that for a given diameter of bamboo pole it outlasts wood by 2-3x.
Provided you don't shatter it.

It depends on the wood. It is comparable to the heartwood of the
medium durable UK trees (e.g. oak but not beech), but doesn't even
begin to compete with yew.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

Nick Maclaren wrote:
In article ,
Martin Brown wrote:
Draven wrote:

I've seen some edging at B&Q made out of bamboo.
How long does it take for bamboo to rot?

It goes brittle fairly rapidly, but it doesn't rot in quite the
same
way as wood if it is a tropical bamboo in a temperate climate. I'd
hazard a guess that for a given diameter of bamboo pole it
outlasts
wood by 2-3x. Provided you don't shatter it.

It depends on the wood. It is comparable to the heartwood of the
medium durable UK trees (e.g. oak but not beech), but doesn't even
begin to compete with yew.

My experience of untreated bamboo canes is that they snap at ground
level in, I don't know, a year or so?

--
Mike.

In article ,
Mike Lyle wrote:

My experience of untreated bamboo canes is that they snap at ground
level in, I don't know, a year or so?

Mine, too. That is comparable with rods made of the heartwood of
things like oak. Ones made of sapwood or even the heartwood of beech
will rarely last that long. Yew is the only native tree that I know
of that lasts longer, or has durable sapwood.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

In article ,
"michael adams" writes:
|
| Elm is durable underwater or in wet clay etc, hence its use for pipes
| coffins etc but apparently rots in the presence of air.

So is oak, and so are many other woods. Most of the harder hardwoods
and a few softwoods are durable when predominantly wet, predominantly
dry or largely anaerobic. They are vulnerable when they are damp and
aerated for long periods, as in the few inches around the soil surface.
This is because the lignin-destroying fungi all need dampness and air
to thrive - anaerobic fungi (like Saccharomyces) generally cannot
break down lignin.

| One possible solution is to build up a stock of foot lengths of old
| copper pipe, conduit etc, blocked off at the bottom end, and slide the
| canes into those.

Or just regard canes as disposable, which is very practical if you
have a large clump of bamboo.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.