help please - neighbour's bamboo popping up in our garden

[mechanicalpencil]

Hello,

My neighbour has a row of bamboo trees at the end of their garden, just next to the boundary of our garden. We have always had a few stalks popping up now and then but just cut them back. Recently, the bamboo is popping up all over, at first it was close to the boundary, but more recently spreading further. It is very close to the shed we recently put up and I am worried about the damage it could potentially do in general. What happens if it gets up to the house?

I spoke to the neighbours once before about it (one year ago) they said they would look into it but never got back to me.

Any advice? Should we just keep hacking it back?

Photo to follow.

Very grateful for any advice.

Roundup root killer. Keep applying it. It degrades in the soil so as long as you are only applying it to whatever it is you want to kill it won't ruin the rest of your garden.

We have this problem too
the mistake I did was to cut them only to find it aggressively spreads if cut
so u need to dig them up it is not easy but do it now before they spread everywhere and they can get under patio , shed etc
eventually u will have to wall them off at your boundary or they will keep coming

Ask them again. See if they are having problems with it. To be honest, if you have lawn it's not so bad as you can get at it to cut it.

It's everywhere else that it's a problem. Try and make a moat/ ditch at the back between you and the bamboo. Then keep that clear to prevent it coming any further in.

Photos. This is the shoot /root type, sorry don’t know correct terminology.
We also get the cane type which grows upwards.

Yes we have the same they are horrible things 😔

Glyphosate concentrate, mix with a bit of ready made wallpaper paste and paint it on. Keep it in a tub and brush them with it repeatedly until they die

The mixing with wallpaper paste makes it easier to do if unwanted stuff mixed in a border or near wanted plants (rather than it spraying all over the place). Also keeps the weed killer in good contact with the weed rather than dripping off

Yes. Glysophate is your friend for dealing with this

I'm a gardener and am dealing with this at a property I work at. If you can, try and have a friendly chat with the neighbour and see if you can work together on the problem. Just cutting it back will cause the roots to spread and pop up elsewhere.

Cut down and dig out as much root as you can and then spray every shoot that comes up with the strongest herbicide you can find and keep doing this until the bamboo dies. It may take 2-3 years of regular re-spraying but will work in the end.

Get rid using methods PP have suggested - our neighbour’s bamboo has wrecked our shed - it’s pushed up through the floor and on the side I can’t access has grown up against the roof overhang and damaged that. They don’t give a toss.

Can you put a barrier at your garden boundary?

This sort of thing. Would need to be about 50cm deep so the bamboo doesn’t grow under it, and stick up about 10cm so it doesn’t grow over. Obviously depends on what is at your boundary, but if it is just a lawn, I’d dig a trench and try to block it.

@Saschka from what the OP has said, it's too late for that solution as the bamboo is already in the garden. As far as this type of bamboo goes I tend towards a 'take off and nuke it from orbit' approach.

I was thinking of the future! I agree she’ll need to use weed killer on the bamboo already in the garden. But it will presumably come back…

For myself, rather than digging 50cm down around the roots, I'd just keep spraying until the bamboo gives up.

That particular variety, if it's the one I think it is, is dreadful stuff. You see it wild in Asia and it covers entire hillsides, there's good reason to keep it out of a domestic garden.

Thanks for all the suggestions.
There is already a ditch between our garden and the bamboo and a fence just before the boundary on the neighbour’s side but the bamboo has significantly weakened the fence.
Some more photos …
The ditch is full of new shoots.

Ugh, that looks familiar.

mechanicalpencil, treat yourself to a new Hebe as the one in the second pic is coming to the end of its life.

@Houseplantmad sorry to hear about your shed. That's what we fear might happen here, as well as it creeping closer and closer to the house. Awful when the neighbours just don't care.

@Saschka that's a useful website, thanks!

@Vegemiteandhoneyontoast yes, I agree, there is definitely good reason to keep it out of gardens. It does look very attractive but I believe even surveyors are calling it the next Japanese knotweed as it can be so invasive. This was presumably a "non-running" / "clumping" type but quite clearly is spreading!
Out of interest, do you often see this as a gardener?

@mechanicalpencil not often, thank goodness. I've only had to tackle it twice in 14 years. One time the bamboo was planted at the front and back of the house and had got right stuck in, so we had to lift a patio to get the roots out, which were as thick as leeks. The current menace is coming through from the neighbour's garden and making its way towards the house. This is the second growing season I've been spraying and it's just starting to get the message. Thankfully, the neighbours are working from their side too.

Thanks for all the great suggestions. I'm just researching options so I can best talk to the neighbour.
One thought though - if I do "nuke" it from my side, will it kill it all on their side too? I don't think they would be very happy about that. Would they be able to sue me for it? It's all a bit of a minefield. I want to stop it from spreading on our side but not necessarily kill the whole thing if that makes sense 😩

Considering the vigour of bamboo, killing it on your side may not kill it on the neighbour's. In the garden where I'm trying to eradicate it, I peeked over the fence and see it's still coming up, but not as vigorously. I don't know if they've been spraying, though it's nowhere near as tall as in the past. I don't think you have a lot of choice with that sort of bamboo, you've either got it or you haven't.

Have you let the neighbours know there's an issue developing? They might be okay with a team effort to tackle it. Approaching neighbours is always nerve wracking and it's always me who gets pushed to the front to deal with things, while the client stands behind me, so I've been there a few times. I put on my best smile and say something like 'Do you think we might have a look at the bamboo? It's making a bid for freedom and I fear where it will end up. Is there anything we can do?'. Once that's said, the neighbours will probably be nervous too, but if you're faultlessly polite and smile a lot then they should hopefully be open to discussing things.

It is very invasive. I have read articles where it has got into foundations and drainage. Not good.

@mechanicalpencil did you manage to find a solution?

@Vegemiteandhoneyontoast dlmt suppose you're based in South Wales. I could really do with a gardener to help me tackle my garden with the same issue 🙈

I was shown a photo by a neighbour of another neighbour’s house where bamboo had forced its way through the tiles just inside the front door! He’s a dreadful prick so I secretly found it hilarious, but not funny in general…

Maybe ask the neighbour to watch https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0hrn6yf
Or
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0024z2v

and explain you are concerned by the bamboo shooting up in your garden.

it could be shooting up within your house. Or theirs.

Sorry, I'm not, @LensLady, or I'd be happy to help.

I'll say this, though. Spraying the foliage did very little so what I started doing was to cut the stems and spray the freshly cut ends with SBK Stump Killer, doing so in autumn as the sap was falling. This does seem to be working, finally, as the bamboo had reached the house walls but is now in retreat. You need to get down on your hands and knees and search out every new tuft of growth and then have at it.

I dislike using poison but this type of bamboo is so invasive that nothing else works.