The Ups and Downs of Bamboo

There was a knock on the door. When I opened it, an elderly lady and her dog stood there. “I see you have bamboo in your yard,” she said. She was pointing to the huge pile of cut bamboo stalks that I had cut and moved to the curb for trash pickup. 

“Actually, my next door neighbor does and I battle to keep it on their side of the fence,” I explained.

She proceeded to give me tips for what I could buy at the hardware store to help and ended by saying, “Bamboo – it doesn’t play nice in a garden.”

I thanked her for her tips and off she went to continue walking her dog.

Bamboo has many good qualities – it offer color and shading and because it grows so tall, privacy protection, too.

But it has a big flaw, too. Its roots constantly shoot out with seemingly no self-control and can quickly overtake the plants on my side of the fence.  

With my gardening persistence and now , tips from my gardening neighbor, I will continue to work to contain the aggressive bamboo roots destroying my backyard plants.  

Why is it that some plants grow and flourish and can stay contained in their place? And others cannot?

I’m starting to see similarities between gardening and people and even elections.