Moso shoots

[bigone5500]

This moso bamboo is one I got from Steve Lau last year. This is the first set of shoots from this plant for me. This photo shows the largest of all the shoots.

[stevelau1911]

With what the weather pattern looks like for the next 2 weeks, they will probably be full height in 2 weeks given that the weather map is showing 80s in the south, and it looks like 50s and 60s are reaching as far north as here. With the warmer temperatures, they will probably grow really tall for their diameter. Your henon should probably be waking up any day too.

Anways, around the 15th of April, it will be my turn to see them come up, but the grove does have leaf damage even though it was under the snow almost the whole winter and moso generally doesn't double or triple in size around here. The rufa is the only thing I get to enjoy during March, and that typically only produces a lot of shoots with little up-size. Some species will need to wait well into May, and even early June to shoot around here.

[bamboothew]

With what the weather pattern looks like for the next 2 weeks, they will probably be full height in 2 weeks given that the weather map is showing 80s in the south, and it looks like 50s and 60s are reaching as far north as here. With the warmer temperatures, they will probably grow really tall for their diameter. Your henon should probably be waking up any day too.

Anways, around the 15th of April, it will be my turn to see them come up, but the grove does have leaf damage even though it was under the snow almost the whole winter and moso generally doesn't double or triple in size around here. The rufa is the only thing I get to enjoy during March, and that typically only produces a lot of shoots with little up-size. Some species will need to wait well into May, and even early June to shoot around here.

Congrats on the nice shoot, bigone!

I saw my first 2 moso shoots yesterday and they are both about double the diameter of the existing 3 foot culms, so I am hoping for 6 foot culms. Thankfully it is not only warm but it is also rainy all day today so I am hoping that is the perfect combination for optimum growth!

[bigone5500]

Here is a new photo of my larger moso. The shot to the left is about three and a half feet tall. The base diameter is about a half inch. I'm hoping this culm gets some good height to it.

[stevelau1911]

Giving a side by side comparison to my 2010 moso shoots which ended up between 3.5ft up to near 6ft those 3 shoots in your latest picture look way more developed than my 4yr old moso which has about an average culm diameter of 0.4 inches. The main difference I see is that in warmer, perhaps drier climates, bamboos will tend to put on size very quickly easily doubling, or tripling their height each year while up here in the north where the soil stays wet year long, never gets hot and has brutal winters, they tend to try and make as many culms as possible, but only put on a minimal size increase. I'll be lucky if I even get above the 1/2 inch mark with the biggest moso shoot this year since it is so hesitant to put on size up here. Luckily some other species meant for zone 6 are gaining size pretty quickly.

Here's what mine looked like when they got just above 2ft last year, and these 6 shoots in the front broke the 5ft mark while temps were 40s-70s in late May.


If that's a 3ft high fence, looks like all 3 of those shoots could break the 6ft mark in another week easily as long as it stays warm in the south.

[bigone5500]

Finally figured out how to post my images so they show up in the post.

That hardware cloth is 24" high if I remember right. I'll go out tonight and measure the exact height of the culm...I just gotta know!

Hardware cloth is 30" tall.

[bigone5500]

Well I measured it! It's a whopping 47" tall! I'm pretty sure it's not done growing either! Does it stop growing when the branches form?..or at what point?

[stevelau1911]

That tall one is no where close to done growing, maybe at 60% grown at best. They are close to their mature height when branches start forming towards the middle of the culm, when lower a few lower sheaths have fallen off, and when true leaves start forming at the top of the shoot. Anyways, I never knew that a 1 gallon moso can put on so much size in 1 year in a suitable climate.

Here's what mine looked like at 80-90% of their full height last June. The piece of wood sticking up is 70 inches high for reference.

[needmore]

Giving a side by side comparison to my 2010 moso shoots which ended up between 3.5ft up to near 6ft those 3 shoots in your latest picture look way more developed than my 4yr old moso which has about an average culm diameter of 0.4 inches. The main difference I see is that in warmer, perhaps drier climates, bamboos will tend to put on size very quickly easily doubling, or tripling their height each year while up here in the north where the soil stays wet year long, never gets hot and has brutal winters, they tend to try and make as many culms as possible, but only put on a minimal size increase. I'll be lucky if I even get above the 1/2 inch mark with the biggest moso shoot this year since it is so hesitant to put on size up here. Luckily some other species meant for zone 6 are gaining size pretty quickly.

Do you think that your 'experiments' with thinning all those culms out last year plus messing around with the rhizomes is a factor in how large yours is getting?

[stevelau1911]

I think with thinning or no thinning, size increases won't be that big around here since it went from 2.5ft in 2008 to 3-4ft in 2009, to 3.5-6ft in 2010 which is when I thinned it out. It is still as bushy as ever. Based on the past performance of this bamboo, I'm probably not getting anything over 8ft especially with the leaf burn which has probably set it back a little.

I'm pretty sure running 12 rhizomes into drainage holes of nursery pots will probably reduce the size for 2012 by a bit when I sever them off this year. I also know the size limitation is not a result of this particular seedling since none of the moso seedlings I still have ever made a huge jump in size. They don't like short growing seasons, long winters, and their leaves don't hold up in this climate so I'll put more faith in my Atrovaginata which went from 2.5ft in 2009 to 5-7ft in 2010. Once I get the heights of my species this year, probably by July, I'll put up a graph of their yearly size increases among all my species to clearly point out which ones stay small forever, and which ones put on size. The slowest ones so far seem to be nitida, rufa, henon, moso while the fastest ones to gain size have been Atrovaginata, parvifolia, dulcis.

[needmore]

Moso seedlings are going to put their energy initially into forming lots of culms with lots of foliage and will not size up much until they reach a certain grove mass which will take a few years. I don't think you have had them long enough to expect appreciable size increases, and stop thinning them out!

[bigone5500]

I measured it again today...and WOW!!! 57" now! It grew 10" in one day. That's amazing. No branches forming as of yet.

I am wondering why these plants are shooting so well and none of my other bamboo is doing anything...

[stevelau1911]

The grove mass is currently at around 2ft X 2ft with 70 culms. It did have bigger (near 0.5) ones emerge last spring which got fried due to a record low in the mid 20s for late May which got replaced with smaller ones after, but it looks like this year shoots will probably come up later. Early shooting of moso is a bit problematic up here while it must be pretty rewarding in the south since it is probably much less prone to deep freezes there even though moso shoots so early. I'm expecting it to try gaining some size again this year, but hopefully they come up after May 1, and the leaf burn hasn't set it back that much. Last year's late freeze destroyed many of my vegetables too.

Here's what it looks like underneath. Some leaf buds have already swelled with the recent 60's which is a bad sign, but I'll take some measures to protect new shoots this year.


It must be very warm in the southeast if bamboos can make gains of nearly a foot/day already in mid-march. They'll probably be leafing out in April, and have a whole 8 months to either make a few more rounds of shoots, or send rhizomes.

[bigone5500]

Steve, it has been fairly warm here. We've hit the 80's a few times already. I don't expect it to get below freezing any more this year but who really knows...

I hope to gain more rhizome this year on these plants.

[bamboothew]

The grove mass is currently at around 2ft X 2ft with 70 culms. It did have bigger (near 0.5) ones emerge last spring which got fried due to a record low in the mid 20s for late May which got replaced with smaller ones after, but it looks like this year shoots will probably come up later. Early shooting of moso is a bit problematic up here while it must be pretty rewarding in the south since it is probably much less prone to deep freezes there even though moso shoots so early. I'm expecting it to try gaining some size again this year, but hopefully they come up after May 1, and the leaf burn hasn't set it back that much. Last year's late freeze destroyed many of my vegetables too.

Here's what it looks like underneath. Some leaf buds have already swelled with the recent 60's which is a bad sign, but I'll take some measures to protect new shoots this year.


It must be very warm in the southeast if bamboos can make gains of nearly a foot/day already in mid-march. They'll probably be leafing out in April, and have a whole 8 months to either make a few more rounds of shoots, or send rhizomes.

Guys, I saw a direct correlation yesterday between the heat and shoot growth. It took all week for my first 2 Moso shoots to get to about 5 inches. Yesterday it got to 84 degrees, about 10 degrees warmer than it had previously gotten, and they doubled in size while I was at work Moso apparently REALLY likes it in the 80's!