Massive Basjoo in flower.. Manchester

Today I was trundling past a house just around the corner from me and spotted a huuuuge Basjoo clump in the front garden. The main one I'd estimate at between 15-20 feet tall, and in flower so I couldn't resist knocking on the door to find out it's story.

The garden belongs to an asian lady, and her broken English wasn't easy to understand although I think I heard well enough to relate what she say's about it.

My first obvious question was regarding overwintering and here's where I got the surprise. She doesn't do anything at all with the Basjoo or its 4 mature pups!. She said she just leaves everything as is and although they die off they come back into growth the following year. She estimated the clump to be around 8 to 9 years old (So they got through 2010 somehow) so here's my question.. Given that Manchester is hardly way up there with the likes of Torquay etc weather wise is it really possible that this clump has died back to root level last winter and still attained such a huge height this summer?, or do Basjoo's reach a point in their maturity whereby they can resist the frost enough to maintain an amount of stem before coming back into growth the following spring???

I didn't have my phone with me today unfortunately, but I'll certainly call back in a day or two and ask if I can take a few photo's.

 

up until 2009 I never protected my basjoos, and they quite often flowered.
Then we had, I think, a run of 3 cold winters when they got cut to the ground, I've never seen one go from the ground, to flowering, in one season.

The last two years I've protected mine, but I dont think I really needed to, as the winters have been mild.
Once the stems reach a certain thickness they do become hardier, as the old leaf stems protect the new inner ones to some extent.

Its a gamble, but if you dont protect you can easily get caught out.

 

I'd say minus 5C is the point where established stems die, but that's just my reckoning.

 

I see. Well I'd loosely estimate the stem at between 5 and 6 inches, so Maybe they got cut down and grew to the present height over the last couple of years.

 

My thoughts are that a stem of that size is unlikely to have grown from the ground this year