How do you make bamboo get really thick stems?

Do you feed it? When and what with?

Do you thin it out?

 

Yes feed it, in spring; mine gets whatever I have to hand when I remember so Growmore, Blood, Fish and Bone and this spring a few handfuls of dried chicken pellets. It also gets a mulch of garden compost occasionally.
Yes thin out; do mine late winter, remove dead/damaged canes, then keep the strongest ones. Thin out to 3 to 6inches apart, depends on you and bamboo, mine is Phyllostachys nigra a slow spreader. I also remove the leaves along the front side to about 4 to 6 ft so you can see the black stems..
Water well in dry weather.
Canes thicken up as the clump matures.

 

Mine's doing OK ... I haven't looked after it as well as I could have, so better results will be easily achievable.

Need to start with a variety that will fatten up For example I don't think that the black stemmed one will ever be beefy. The one that is doing best here is Phyllostachys vivax 'Aureocaulis' - which also has a pretty green vertical stripe.

My understanding is that the emerging new canes in Spring need lots of water, and then once they have opened their branches and leaves they then start to fatten up the rhizomes for next year, so that is the time to feed (although some feed in spring to help the massive new growth is helpful); heavy feeding to build the rhizomes can play a part in how fast they grow the following year. They mostly want Nitrogen, so a lawn fertiliser (NOT weed & feed !!) would suit them, or fish blood and bone ... but anything will do. Watering in dry periods too, as for other plants.

I leave all the fallen leaves (and also any thinnings) around the base as I believe they need Silica, which is hard to extract from the soil, so i assume the decaying leaves will help.

I thin mine, taking out the weedier canes once the new canes have got a full set of leaves on them, and I also take off the lower leaves 'coz I think they look smarter.



My Phyllostachys vivax 'Aureocaulis' planted in 2012

2012 size


2013 size


2014 size


2018 size

I must be a Proper Gardener as my fingernails are grubby ... every year!

Compton Acres


If you haven't already bought the plants I can recommend Paramount plants. Right now the only ones they have in stock are in 70L pots, and cost a fortune. We planted some at the office a few years ago, much smaller pots and more affordable, and they absolutely romped away, so might be worth keeping an eye on their stock, or asking them.

Phyllostachys Vivax Aureocaulis Golden Chinese Timber Bamboo

 

I can confirm that Phyllostachys nigra is not one of the beefier ones, my thickest cane is about the size of my thumb, works very well as canes for beans etc.
I also leave all the dry culms etc in the bottom, self mulching or too much like hard work to clear out; downside is the local cats use them as a dry sunny resting place.

 

That's definitely not my reason ... oh no ...

 

I'm interested in this as about 20 years ago I grew some bamboo from seed. I think it was the edible one pubescens maybe.
Any way it's never formed more than a 4ft high bush and the stems are pretty feeble.
It gets no feeding as I thought bamboo was supposed to be rampant stuff and the stems are about pencil thickness at most.
Oh and I don't water it either.

 

I'd say the water is the critical factor, more so than food. My black-stemmed bamboo sulked here for years until a drain was re-directed and it suddenly got a lot of moisture, even in summer. The difference in the size and quality of canes was very marked.