Unlike running bamboo (Bambuseae) that can pop up across your lawn, clumping bamboo will stay put, even as its shoots multiply. Removal of clumping bamboo, whether to eradicate or transplant, is a task. Clumping bamboo varieties are found throughout the Bambuseae household in Phyllostachys and the genera Fargesia. Fargesia bamboo develops in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 5 through 9; Phyllostachys species range between USDA zones 1 and 9.
Growth Habits
Clumping bamboo blossoms are actually rhizomatous like running bamboo roots. But while running bamboo roots easily expand to 4 ft or more bamboo blossoms are more restrained. They disperse than about two inches, just enough to send a culm up — that the bud stalk visible above ground. This habit results in clumps of bamboo culms which should be dug up and divided every one to prevent roots. You move the bamboo to a different area of the backyard or give it to friends and can remove the main branches in the original website — bamboo plants that are noninvasive make great neighbors. Your neighbors may happily welcome a bamboo branch, but the area can be quickly taken over by bamboo plants that are running, so it’s best to refrain from giving those.
Digging Up Roots
Given the lengths of the bamboo rhizomes, the job of the culms provide an accurate tool for determining location of the root chunk to you. Cut the culms back to the ground using loppers or a pruning saw to make the main ball manageable. Sterilize your pruning tools using a 10 percent solution of bleach. Visualize a circle round the culms, about two inches in the surface culms. This extra 2 inches compensates for any rhizomes which have spread in the ground without sprouting culms. Cut the soil, after the ring, using a digging spade. Cut a different circle about two inches outside the one, and take out the soil between the two cuts. Insert a shovel in the 2-inch gapand remove the root ball.
After the Digging
Removal of the main ball may leave a rather substantial hole in your lawn, based on size and the age of the bamboo clump. The ground and the hole carefully shoots. Before you back-fill the hole with fresh topsoil remove the small rhizome pieces. The soil that clings to the roots can be reused by you, but you have to select through the soil carefully to remove any rhizomes that may break off. If you wish to relocate the bamboo clump, divide the root ball to about four components that are equal, based on the dimensions. Plant the branches to the original planting depth in a website with comparable sun exposure to the spot, and water to ensure transplant success.
Site Maintenance
A rhizome pieces may stay in the soil no matter you’re when sifting through the dirt. These rhizomes can develop into bamboo plants that are fresh after you remove the bulk of the clump. Monitor the area where you removed the bamboo to get expansion over a period of one. Cut a circle round any fresh bamboo culms and remove them in the ground. This might be as easy as pulling up the new shoots with your hands in case you have sandy soil, light or if the soil hasn’t settled. A garden trowel works, if you establish themselves in the ground and catch the shoots.