The bamboo saga continues

As I posted in June, we were scared of our running bamboo. It was far more vigorous than the type we had at our previous home. In spite of our trenching sand trap method, the bamboo was traveling - too fast.

We had the option of some cheap digging labor. So we jumped on it and had ALL our lovely bamboo removed.

Gaaaahhh! All our privacy. All our lush green. Three years of growth. Gone.

Our neighbor's driveway and house: right there in our faces.

From inside the house looking out, it seems even more glaringly bare.

Ideas for replacing our overly-vigorous running bamboo came pouring in from readers after I requested suggestions. And there were such great options. We wanted the look and performance of bamboo, but in a manageable form. Megan of Nest Maker suggested the Bamboo Garden, a local specialty nursery in North Plains. After checking them out on line and looking at the cold-hardy clumping bamboos, we knew we needed to make a trip out there.

Regretfully, I didn't have the sense to take pictures, but we had a fabulous time looking around at all the options. If you need a bamboo for any situation in your garden, they have it. And it's great to be able to see mature specimens in their display gardens.

We ended up selecting five 2-gallon pots of Fargesia robusta "Campbell form", a cold-hardy clumping bamboo. They're small pots, with just three to four culms in each, but they're far too expensive not to do the deferred gratification thing for awhile.

The Campbell form is more upright than the other Fargesia robusta cultivars, so it seemed the best one for our narrow planting area.

Here's our inspiration for the future - a photo of Fargesia robusta "Campbell" I borrowed from the Bamboo Garden website. This clump looks to be about four to six years old. It's beautiful, with that striped effect created by the husks on the new culms.

In our excitement at finding a clumping bamboo that worked, we sort of overlooked the fact that the Fargesia would like a bit more shade than it will get right now. Although this bamboo was field grown and should be more tolerant of sun, these pots had been in a greenhouse. Since we want our new bamboo to have the best possible start, we'll delay planting it until September, when the sun isn't so intense.

Our bamboo is currently residing on our covered back patio (with a skylight cover above it) where it can pretend it's still in the greenhouse.

Meanwhile, what about our glaring lack of privacy? I had some reed fencing left over from covering a gate, so I tried it out on one panel of the fence. Success! By fitting the reed tightly into the black-painted fence panels, we got a slightly Asian look, and it will probably hold up longer than if it was just hung on the fence.

So far, we've only covered the fence where the bamboo was removed, but we're so happy with the improvement that we've decided to cover the complete east side of the back garden. The reed fencing creates the illusion of privacy while being open enough to allow some light and good airflow. The reeds will probably last about as long as it takes for our existing screening plants (and the new bamboo) to really take over the job. Why didn't we do this three years ago??!!

For the rest of summer, though, we can grow some vegetables in the vacated land. I got an acorn squash, a zucchini, and some basil starts to take full advantage of this sunny spot for the next couple of months.

With any luck, I'll even get to plant them this weekend since it's going to cool down a little.