Comments on: Nature at night

By: Eilish

Eilish — Mon, 19 May 2008 23:37:15 +0000

I also echo the bamboo warning, but as Carol said, there are a number of lovely clumping varieties that will not spread aggressively. Make sure to ask a good nursery for suggestions.

As for a moon garden, my personal suggestion is a beautiful (and non-aggressive) perennial called lamium. It has a very soft purple flower and a light green, heart-shaped leaf with a white blush. It is so beautiful at night!

By: Lori

Lori — Mon, 19 May 2008 20:43:56 +0000

Mexican primrose and lamb’s ear are two others that spread.

By: Jennie

Jennie — Mon, 19 May 2008 18:21:54 +0000

Kudzu, wisteria, and bamboo have taken over the south! Find any ravine off the interstate and this is what you will see.

By: Carol

Carol — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:02:39 +0000

There’s more than one kind of bamboo - plant the stuff that doesn’t spread. Fargesia robusta is a “clumping” type that grows from rhizomes. The kind you don’t want is the “running” type. That kind will take over the world eventually…

By: Never teh Bride

Never teh Bride — Sat, 17 May 2008 13:08:24 +0000

You can eat bamboo shoots? I guess I’ve probably had them in stir fries before, but when I first read your comment I was downright amazed…

By: rachel

rachel — Sat, 17 May 2008 06:32:16 +0000

For real, be careful with bamboo! I love it and have had it in all my gardens, but it really does require a lot of maintenance. If you want bamboo, make sure to pull up the shoots when they fist begin to appear. Try walking around the area with barefeet and you can feel them before you can see them. They’re super tasty in stir-fries and stuff.

By: Jennie

Jennie — Fri, 16 May 2008 20:55:04 +0000

Seymore, FEED ME!!!!

By: Never teh Bride

Never teh Bride — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:49:27 +0000

I don’t know why, TeleriB, but the idea of a plant coming through one of my home’s vents freaks me the heck out. It would give me the creeps!

By: TeleriB

TeleriB — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:23:08 +0000

ZOMG, bamboo?! Plant bamboo responsibly. We lived in a place where a prior tenant had planted some as a privacy screen around the back deck - a little 4′ run of bamboo. It spread - my goodness, did it spread. Under the deck. Out the other side. Threatening to crack the asphalt of the driveway with bamboo shoots! We had bamboo in our central air conditioning vents. (It was a trailer, okay? The bamboo got under the trailer, started pushing out through the skirting, and got its stalks into the A/C vents. There was a shoot coming up through the intake vent in the kitchen!)

I am convinced that bamboo is one of the psycho slasher/stalkers of the plant world. It just keeps growing and nothing will stop it! We hacked down every shoot we could reach, poured salt water on it, covered it with black tarps - and still had to pull up new shoots regularly, because the runners were deep underground and would not die.

I have seen some people maintain groves of bamboo. I think it takes unending vigilance, and (for preference) a natural boundary like a stream or cliff on as many sides as possible. Beware!