Thinning Groves

[Bamboomoon]

Last autumn I took a local grower's advice and cut down most culms in a Nigra stand that were within 8 inches of one another. I left two of the whipshoots out at the edges of the "grove" (about 18 feet long, 3 foot narrow). I've heard a theory that one should never cut more than a third of any grove. I went quite beyond that before counting culms (and realizing with some belated fear) that I might have undermined the energy stored in the rhizomes and leaves. To my astonishment and relief, the grove is now sending up culms between the whipshoots on either (long) side of the grove, and several are nearly twice the diameter of older culms. While I would guess that the "one third" theory is a pretty good yardstick, in this instance, in a Nigra grove at least, the "thinning" produced exactly the result I was looking for.

[tstoehr]

I'm a believer in grove thinning. I much prefer the look of grove of well-spaced, thick, straight culms. A dense thicket of bamboo in my opinion is unsightly, yet so common. I have a grove of Bory that is still expanding to fill the alotted space and I thin out quite a few of the new culms. It's nice to be able to remove the small or leaning ones and leave the larger, straight ones. And in fact this year I've removed some of last years culms to make room for the larger new culms. I have no indication that the strength or vigor of the plant is reduced. It seems quite the reverse actually.
I figure when the grove occupies all the space I've allocated for it, and the grove is well thinned, then I won't want a larger number of culms from year to year. So each year every new shoot that I leave to grow will mean removing on old one.
That means I'll have poles for use in the garden and harvested young shoots for the stir fry. Hey, what more do you want?