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Invasion from next door
AnnieAnnie
Posts: 19
My neighbour's bamboo is beginning to come up in my garden, what can I do about it?
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I'd politely tell him about it first to see if he could solve it from his side. If you have no success then you have two options. First you can dig next to the boundary and put a physical barrier between the bamboo and your garden. Sheet perspex is one of the best barriers angled into his side. Or spray any emerging shoots with glyphosate based weed killer. The latter may kill the whole plant, although that's unlikely with bamboos. The wrong bamboos on boundaries just like leyllandii can be a source of great contention between neighbour's.
I really don't want to fall out over this, we have always got on well. I'm not sure I'm up to digging, how deep would the barrier have to be and also how wide?
I have an entire row of bamboo aurea about 2 feet from the boundary fence, eight plants in all, they are all in a row so that it looks like a hedge. They are however, all in huge black rubber pots - just because they are so invasive. We've erected a two foot high lattice-work fence in front of them so that the pots can't be seen, it looks lovely and there's no friction with my neighbour.
I really do think it's totally irresponsible to plant bamboo where it could encroach into a neighbour's garden, nobody wants the conflict or the problem. I would follow Dave's suggestions, I'd first politely ask your neighbour if they can think of a solution - I'm sure they wouldn't want to fall out either. If you could resolve it between yourselves that would be great. Your neighbour has after all, caused the problem, and you'd be giving them the chance to do something about it - do they even know there's a problem? A friend of mine planted bamboo in her border, completely ignorant of its growth habit, and it came up in her lawn in no time at all. She had to have a landscape gardener in to dig it all up and repair the lawn. It;s a real problem, but good luck and do let us know how you get on.