Black bamboo - when can it go out?

Evening all.

Last autumn I bought a black bamboo. It was only a tenner (reduced from £40) due to it not being in perfect condition. Because it was a bit poorly (not too bad, just a few leaves going brown and crispy at the edges), and because winter started to get a bit nasty, I brought it indoors. It's been in the utility room now for about 4 months.

I think its itching to go out. I know they are shade tolerant but this one has had no real sunshine for months.

The trouble is, now it will have gone soft, so I'm a bit worried about putting it out.

Any ideas how I can ease its trauma and get it outside? I know about hardening off but it is massive, and I had to bend it quite a lot to make it fit in the house at all, so constantly taking it in and out will punish it a bit I think.

 

If you are worried put out during the day and then bring it in do that for about two weeks, but bamboo are tougher than you think and they do get pot bound very quickly plus they are hungary plants , has it had heat to make it grow ?? in the utility room if not plant it out they take about a year to settle in you may have one or two new canes this year but it will be concentrating on putting its roots out so keep it well watered durring the summer give a feed late spring or mix into planting hole then dont feed again until next spring I made the mistake a couple of years ago fed mid summer made the folliage too soft covered in aphids following spring all beacause I fed mid summer . I tottaly agree with Armandii



I would plant it out

Spruce

 

Thanks folks. I'll put it out.

The only thing is though it will have to stay in a container for now, not necessarily the one it came in, perhaps a bigger one. I can't put it straight in the ground for a couple of reasons. I'm not exactly sure where it's going yet, and also my ground isn't ready yet.

Will it be ok outside in a container? The only thing I'm worried about on that score is that containers don't offer the roots much protection from frost compared to the ground.

 

plant in the biggest pot you can get John innes no3 soil based compost this is important , NOT MUTI - PURPOSE if its staying in the pot for a while, not a problem with frost now you could always wrap the pot up if you are worried. and you can have a play around with were to put it while its still in its pot .

You can replant any time now until Christmas

Spruce

 

Out for the day, in for the night, for two weeks to harden it off. Put it out earlier, and bring it in later, so it gets a bit more "cold" as the fortnight progresses (if you are home and able to do that, otherwise find a sheltered spot and put out before you go to work, and perhaps choose a less sheltered spot as the fortnight progresses.

If you are going to plant it out in the next couple of months I would not repot it - the roots will have barely formed into the new compost by the time you plant it out, and all the new compost will just fall off, which will be more of a transplanting operation than a plant-out one, which won't be so kind to the plant in mid Summer.

But if its likely it will be in a pot all Summer? then repotting now would help it.

 

Thanks for the advice folks.

I haven't bothered with hardening off, purely because the room it spent winter in is the coldest room in the house. Being unheated and single glazed (a former outhouse which someone in the past modified into an extension of the house), it will have endured temperatures close to freezing right through winter.

I haven't repotted it because the biggest pot I have is no bigger than the one it was already in.

I've came up with a cunning plan, remembering the advice of the old bloke that I used to live next door to. I found a sheltered spot in the garden that's out of the way of the bits I'm working on, dug a hole big enough to accomodate the whole pot, sunk the whole pot in the ground, then added more soil to just to say cover the top rim of the pot. It is sheltered under next door's massive tree, and will only get direct sunshine in the evening, so conditions shouldn't be too harsh for it. As soon as I get the ground prepared and landscaped how I want it, I'll move the bamboo to its final spot and relieve it of its pot.

 

I haven't decided yet. I might contain it, but according to the research I've done it is of the clump forming vareity rather than the really invasive kind.

I look forward to having that opportunity. The neighbours probably already already think I'm odd after gather to watch as I entertained them with my innovative method of enabling the scrap man to take away my last car that was stuck on the front lawn (it involved liberal use of a sledge hammer).

 

When you first put it out place it somewhere shady so it can get used to higher light levels.

It would probably have been fine over winter anyway.

 

If its Nigra its clump forming so not a problem, i have had some in the garden for many years and it doesnt wander. I have a few smaller Nigra and they suffer a little over winter but they remain outside all year round and always come back in spring.