How to Elminate Bamboo

[Mci1231]

I need help. Live in Pa. My son purchased a house which the back 1/3 of his property was/is a bamboo patch. I want to turn it into grass. The property has a decent slope. I am a former landscaper but I am at a total loss for this situation.‘I’ve been cutting the new shoots as they begin to rise. How do I eliminate it and how do I plant a lawn on top of it?

 

[Sean Regan]

Hi and welcome.
A lot depends on the variety of bamboo.
They can send out horizontal rhizomes that can come up yards from the parent plant.
If you want to completely eliminate it, you'll probably need to rotavate most of the garden and remove every scrap of root, or it will likely regrow.

 

[Mci1231]

Thanks for the info. It does send horizontal shoots that come from the web of roots. It’s too large of an area to dig out and I’m not certain a Bobcat would work.

 

[cpp gardener]

Apply undiluted glyphosate (Roundup) to freshly cut stems and any subsequent new growth. It will probably take most of a year to completely kill it.

 

[Meadowlark]

There is an alternative to using glyphosate and that's frequent mowing. Over time the bamboo will give it up. In my rural area there is a lot of bamboo growing wild and if left undisturbed it would spread and invade, but mowing is an effective control tool. I have producing hay fields right next to big stands of bamboo that is controlled with nothing but mowing.

Its controversial but studies have associated glyphosate with non-Hodgkin lymphoma in humans. Personally, I would not apply/handle undiluted glyphosate, nor would I recommend anyone do that. The choice, of course, is up to you.

 

[Mci1231]

Thanks for the suggestions.

 

[Mr_Yan]

I have read about a similar method to constant mowing. Chop it to the ground. Let it flush up and spend a ton of energy making canes but cut them again before it sends out leafs from the canes. The thinking is it will suck a maximum amount of energy from the root system making big new canes but as the leafs have yet to unfurl they're not really putting energy back into the plant. It won't be a once and done killing but it passes my BS logic test.

 

[Mci1231]

I have been cutting the shoots as soon as I see them. However, the weather is warming and I suspect there is no way I can keep that up so I’ll switch to using a mower several times a week. I have several big mowers from my cleanup on AWD landscape business. I just never really dealt with bamboo before . Trying to restore to grass once the bamboo dies off I’d whole other issue.

 

[cpp gardener]

If you want to spend 3 or 4 years mowing bamboo it will work. Glyphosate is faster and safer than cigarettes, coffee, vinegar, sugar or table salt. Just wear vinyl gloves when handling pesticides and don't drink them.

 

[Meadowlark]

... It won't be a once and done killing but it passes my BS logic test.

Neither will glyphosate be once and done. If there is even one sprig of the stuff bordering the property but outside the treated space, it will come back. Guaranteed. Treating it requires a lifetime commitment,

"I want to turn it into grass" Means it is going to be mowed anyway. That's what most do to grass...mow it. Logical. Three or four years...

 

[Meadowlark]

Photo to illustrate.

One could treat the green area shown in the photo below with glyphosate every year when bamboo shoots show for the rest of their lives and the bamboo would still come back every year...unless the neighboring bamboo is also removed. If that neighboring bamboo happens to be on property owned by others (such as the property to the left of the fence below), you are stuck.

The only practical control in this situation is mowing...and it is totally effective immediately.