Three variegated Phyllostachys arcana ‘Luteosulcata’ seedlings are now all around 1 year old. All three are still showing different degrees of variegation. As I’ve mentioned in my previous posts, I placed them into a more shaded position during the summer. The reason for that was the fact, that the most variegated seedling started showing leaf burn when exposed to full sun in the spring. The damage in the spring could also be a result of change of growth environment, not the light exposure alone. The reason for that was, because I wanted to see, if shaded location affects variegation level and if the leaves remain healthy – without burnt leaf tips. I planted them in the same raised bed with my chillies. I never expected the peppers to grow that large and bamboo seedlings got completely shaded out by early summer.

During most of the spring, the seedlings received full sun exposure. At that point, they had shown some growth, but not nearly as much as while they were inside under LED grow light. Even the smallest seedling that was about to perish, managed to push out two tiny shoots, both more variegated than it’s original shoot. Shade prevented it to continue growing during the summer. The largest, most variegated seedling stopped growing completely and only managed to unfold a couple of leaves. The leaves remained healthy and I think there was no difference in variegation strength. It was way to shaded to grow and it would certainly not survive another season like that. The least variegated seedling was also placed in deep shade. It somehow managed to grow a couple of new shoots and leaves throughout the summer. It’s showing a lot less variegation and most of the leaves remained dark green, which allowed it to photosynthesize in low light environment.

None of my seedlings had shown any culm variegation of the mother plant, Phyllostachys arcana ‘Luteosulcata’, so far. The variegated seedlings are not nearly large enough to show it. I am now deciding what to do with the seedlings, if weather permits, I could leave them outside during the winter. Much more likely, I’ll just bring the seedlings inside, not just because of the poor current weather forecast, the main reason is, that the seedlings are really not in their best shape. Full shade might not have been the best idea. 🙂

Update a week later…

We did receive enormous amounts of rain and weather cooled down considerably, so I moved the variegated bamboos inside. I have placed them into small pots where they can recover, before I up-pot them for overwintering inside. None of them had shown any leaf curl, which means there was not much root damage when I dug them out from the raised bed. A couple of days after I brought them inside, I have noticed some shoots that started growing when temperature increased.