Jedd Rashbrooke

Hi Sebastien,

Been a while since I did some real boo research -- I had the luxury 15 years or so ago of having a set of constraints that made selection pretty straightforward.  I also got a lot of good information and advice from a local bamboo nursery owner - here in Australia we only have a few people specialising in propagating bamboo, and they're all well informed and very helpful.

I've just done a web search on "bamboo species selector" and found a few pages, some of which are a little basic, and likely reflect the species that can grow near that particular nursery.    So I'd suggest finding a local nursery that specialises in bamboo and having a chat with them.

Sites like:   http://www.bamboo.org/BambooSourceList/BambooSelector.php    and  https://www.bambooweb.info/SSL.php   let you put in a bunch of features & constraints but they can't catch everything.

I'd strongly recommend avoiding running bamboo, but then you're still got considerations around edible, timber/structural, upright/weeping, windbreak (leafiness in the lower parts), culm thickness, height, how much effort you're willing to put in to clearing out old culms, whether you're happy to prune the tops a couple of times a year to control height, soil type, rainfall / irrigation options, CZ & HZ, whether it needs a temperate zone for the winter dormancy, hedging / animal exclusion, aesthetics ... and probably a bunch more.   If you get your list of preferences for each of these aspects, a bamboo expert can give you a shortlist.

Peter VanDerWal wrote:
With your idea, if the pumps fail during rainfall then you won't collect any water, and you can't use water you don't have.

You're absolutely right, and I should have been clearer.

I wasn't / wouldn't anticipate someone in this situation having a single tank - certainly they need a collecting tank sufficiently large to cope with water from the roofs of both the main and the guest structures during a rainfall event (hence my question about intensity and duration of the 'two rainy periods a year').

A header tank - if it's less than 20k litres - is probably more frustrating in terms of keeping it full (which is why in general I advocate large storage tanks at the top of the property) ... but naturally depends on the scale of the operation here.

From what you've described, I'd advise against it.

I grow Bambusa oldhammii, B. textilis (Gracilis), and a few B. multiplex (silverstripe, alphonse karr).

All boos will have a listed maximum height, which assumes ideal conditions, with qualifiers around your climate - so for B. oldhammii f.e. it's meant to get up to about 17 metres, but I should expect in my climate (9b, ~600mm annual rainfall, temps up to 45C during summer) about 75% of that.

On the upside, while these things are not happy if they don't get much water during summer, they will survive, as they've got fantastic root systems.  You say you'll irrigate, but I'd suggest if that fails and you get a row of hot days, you may end up with an unhappy fire hazard.

Also with only 30cm or less of soil, the things are going to be heavily stunted / dwarfed -- nearly impossible to estimate heights, but more importantly means they'll likely blow out of your channel during even a mild wind.

Could I suggest instead that you find a clumping bamboo you like - right height, tolerates your climate, edible - and plant that at the appropriate spacing (depends if you want a screen - say 800-1000mm spacing - or for harvesting - maybe 3-4 metre spacing) in open ground.

Gracilis is edible, very upright, looks good.  Might be too tall for your liking, but you can trim the culms to the right height -- this is a regular, non-trivial task though.    B.multiplex has been very tolerant, not sure how edible it would be (very narrow shoots, so it'd be fiddly to harvest and prepare, in any case).  B.oldhammii is one of the best in terms of size, use (edible, construction) but depending how well you look after it, it'll likely be 6-15 metres tall.

There's lots of boo matrix / recommendation sites out there to find the climate / function / size / form that you're looking for.     The big thing I'd suggest is to avoid running bamboos entirely, and just look at clumpers -- much much easier to maintain.

I put in a concrete water tank (120k litres) in 2008 for about AUD $20,000

I'm happy with the decision.

Thoughts / suggestions:

I'd probably not do a 50kl tank, as that's only twice the capacity of two large plastic tanks (we have 5 of these around the place).  Compared to concrete, plastic tanks tend to be cheaper, you can split your water storage into different locations, and you can move them (not easy, but doable).  Obviously you'd need to run the prices locally -- I expect concrete tanks are cheaper in ES than AU.  (Everything's expensive in AU)

You say that you have lots of water twice a year - do you mean a couple of single events, or over a period of several weeks?  

I ask because placement is important, especially if you want to run irrigation from the tank using gravity.   Solar-pumps obviously don't work while it's raining, but if you've got battery capacity to move water uphill, I'd recommend putting whatever tanks you've got as high up your property as possible, particularly if you end up with a single large concrete tank.  It just opens up your options later.

Water cleanliness - I use a 2" mesh filter for water coming in.  I get water from a spearpoint at the river, which is 'mostly' clean, but has some iron salts (not going to be filtered by mesh), and some very fine grit/sand (mostly filtered by mesh).   I also have filters on the outlet pipes just before any irrigation gear, as I use gravity fed dribblers.   If you keep the tank sealed properly, and have a filter on the way in (if it's rainwater, then one of those 60 litre overflow gutter attachments work well), you shouldn't  need to clean it out very often.  (I haven't cleaned mine at all yet).   Remember that you can dredge out most tanks, without emptying them, and probably only lose a few hundred litres of water in the process.

You'll see with my tank the roof doesn't catch its own water (bit of a waste), and has grooves under which they put small foam plugs that fell out the first time it got windy.  I should have gone around and glued / foamed up all the gaps properly, but frogs and dust will probably always find a way in.

I've been experimenting with bamboo (of the living kind) fencing.  More permy than wire, less maintenance, but obviously longer to erect, and needs its own protective fencing while establishing.

Depending on your climate you can likely find a species that works suitably.

Thorny hedges may work, but during droughts here (in AU) the local wildlife here will happily spend all night nibbling every single leaf off a prickly tree (roses, brambles, wild citrus, etc).  Plus prickly plants a pain to manage if you need to do any pruning / re-planting, etc.

I've been experimenting with Bambusa oldhamii -- edible, useful as timber, non-thorny, fairly upright, hardy, frost-tolerant, grows to about 12 metres (but can be trimmed to preferred height).  Also good for retaining soil -- if your fence lines align with your contours.  Fodder option, too, of course.  It'd certainly grow tall and thick enough to stop deer, but depending on climate it may take 3-5 years.