When we lived in the big house on the other side of town about 10 years ago I found a guy a few miles away that had 2 types of bamboo growing in his back yard. One size is about 7/8" diameter 15 ft long this if perfect size for fishing poles. The other size measures 1 3/4" diameter 25 ft long. I got several bamboo poles that he cut and threw on the street I tried to use them in the garden.
A few years later house was for sale owner said, dig up all the bamboo roots you want. Bamboo was impossible to dig up the soil was like 100s of rope size roots going in 100s of directions so I got an axe an chopped out 3 or 4 rhyzone roots of each size bamboo and planted them in a certain spot of my yard. I read the roots have been known to travel 50 feet under a highway and come up on the other side so my plan was to be able to till a circle around the plants once a month to stop roots trying to get out of the area. Nothing grew 2 summers in a row we sold the house and moved to a smaller house.
Fast forward. About 2 months ago my neighbor at the old house called to tell me neighbor across the street has a giant pile of cut bamboo 4 ft deep, 6 ft wide across the whole front yard 150 ft long piled next to the street for the city to pick up. I was surprised that bamboo grew so I drove past our old house to look. I should have taken my camera, there is still a forest of bamboo growing in the back yard. LOL. It looks like the new owner never tried to keep the bamboo under control it is so easy to mow new shoots down with the lawn mower.
We parked the vehicle in front of the house to look. Wow what a nightmare of bamboo 1/2 of the back yard is a solid forest of mixed bamboo growing right up to 3 property line fences. No bamboo in neighbors yard they must be mowing down new shoots with the lawn mower. The large size bamboo is growing 25 ft tall bamboo about 8" between each bamboo pole. The smaller size bamboo is growing in the spaces between the larger bamboo. It is such a tight growth of bamboo a small dog or cat would be a tight squeeze for them to get into the bamboo forest. LOL I am surprised the new owner let that bamboo take over the yard like that.
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applestar
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Original concept material used at the STARDOME website was split bamboo —
Subject: NEW PROJECT - Star Dome structure
Subject: NEW PROJECT - Star Dome structure
applestar wrote:I mentioned in passing elsewhere that I want to build a STARDOME structure. I’ve been researching and drawing ideas from various sources, but they all seem to have been inspired by this site:
STARDOME, STARDOME, the most excellent bamboo dome.
https://www.stardome.jp/how-en.html
[...]
I live close to the Mississippi River and it is chock full of willow trees between the levee and the river bank. Before I built my permanent trellis with treated wood and hog wire, I'd head out to the river with a machete and cut down dozens of small willow branches, strip them of their smaller limbs and use them tied up in a teepee fashion for beans and cucumbers to climb on.
We used to make artificial beehives with bamboo. You need 3/8- 1/2 inch bamboo. One end sealed. A bundle is tied and then hung in a tree for carpenter bees. Alternatively, the bamboo can be put in cans or buckets with varying sizes of bamboo diameters and the bucket is placed on its side in a shady spot.
I remember my uncle used of send us packages with bamboo shoots we would have to peel, boil and bottle.
We used to make bamboo fishing poles out of the fresh canes.
It is true, if the bamboo is not cured properly it pretty much turns to dust. Literally, the post beetles get into the bamboo and turn it into dust. Bamboo will shrink as it loses water. If you want to keep bamboo as a novelty you can cut a culm of bamboo with a couple of intact nodes. As long as you water from the top and the lower node is intact, the bamboo will sprout at the node and it will grow for a while if you water inside the bamboo culm.
I remember my uncle used of send us packages with bamboo shoots we would have to peel, boil and bottle.
We used to make bamboo fishing poles out of the fresh canes.
It is true, if the bamboo is not cured properly it pretty much turns to dust. Literally, the post beetles get into the bamboo and turn it into dust. Bamboo will shrink as it loses water. If you want to keep bamboo as a novelty you can cut a culm of bamboo with a couple of intact nodes. As long as you water from the top and the lower node is intact, the bamboo will sprout at the node and it will grow for a while if you water inside the bamboo culm.
Clumping bamboo does not run but the clumps will get larger and expand over time. Most of the mini bamboo are runners. It snows in Japan and China so there must be some cold hardy bamboo that will tolerate at least a light frost. It is actually awesome to walk through a bamboo grove. The 80-100 ft bamboo towering above and a soft mat of leaves underfoot. When the wind blows gently, you can hear the leaves rustling and the bamboo creaking and bumping into each other.
One bamboo culm is very flexible and in a strong wind it will snap. However, when bamboo is bound together, it is very strong. After heavy storms when it floods in the garden up to 15 ft, and with winds up to 60 mph we can usually see the house on the other side of the garden where before we only saw the bamboo. It grows back in a few months.
One bamboo culm is very flexible and in a strong wind it will snap. However, when bamboo is bound together, it is very strong. After heavy storms when it floods in the garden up to 15 ft, and with winds up to 60 mph we can usually see the house on the other side of the garden where before we only saw the bamboo. It grows back in a few months.