The following was received via email: I have a very healthy and fast growing lucky bamboo. It seems to be growing too large for the small vase it came in. I would like for it to continue to grow but know that it requires a larger pot. How do I safely transplant it and when. It's indoors and I live on Long Island, New York. It's april 14th and as an additional question, can I transplant it outdoors? Thank you for your time and I hope you can help me perserve this healthy and lucky Bamboo.
Here's a helpful site when I was looking for info on my bamboo. I planted mine in soil and was told to take it out and just keep it in filtered water. My room mate also said his friend planted it in soil and it died. Dunno, planting it in soil may depend on a lot of things. Lucky Bamboo
I took the lucky bamboo out of the vase it came in -- the roots may be wrapped with a sponge (depending on where you bought your lucky bamboo). I would definitely keep the lucky bamboo in a bigger vase with filtered water. I added some rocks into the vase to keep the bambbo upright in the vase. Don't pot it in soil or outdoors. If you don't like the sponge that wraps around the roots, you can remove the spong carefully, and try not to rip off all the roots..
I recently received a rather ailing Lucky Bamboo, also only in water. After being put into a soil-based mixture with a good handful of perlite added for drainage, it seems to be doing just fine. In fact, it's put out a new leaf or two. It seems to like being a bit swampy now and again, so I give it a lot of water about once a week then let it sit. I've given it a Heartleaf Philodendron for company, as they're both serious water-drinkers.
The lucky bamboo is easy to live buy should avoid too much direct sunlight; and too salty or heavily-flouridated tap water.
Information to take it out of soil and put it in water is not scientifically based. This plant grows naturally in soil in the rain forests of Africa. It is not aquatic. Naturally, you will not find it growing in water. There are a number of threads on this plant on this board. Type in either lucky bamboo or Dracaena sanderiana and read a few of the more recent ones. You'll find quite a few people who've asked the same question you asked and decided to take their plants out of the water and put them in soil! The people who started the craze of buying this plant in a fish store are the ones who want you to believe they should be grown in water. They are making a lot of money promoting this craze. There are many long term problems created by attempting to do this, most are touched on in these threads.
Lucky bamboo is easy to care, easy to grow, you can say that it's a tough garden plant. They will stop growing any more after flowering, this is almost same as a real bamboo plant.
You hear so many times of this plant going yellow and soft after a couple of years in water, that's why I moved mine from water to soil. Both Dracaena sanderiana (lucky bamboo) were purchased in small vases of water. After about a year or so, I moved them both into soil, I think it was in late spring or summer that was done. They share a pot with some Syngoniums, since both kinds of plants like their soil a little on the moist side. They also like the same kind of diffused light. Both are doing very well since the move to soil (a year or two ago) and seem very happy in their new medium.
The so-called "Luck Bamboo" is not a bamboo at all, it is a species of Dracaena from western Africa. It is commonly called Dracaena sanderiana in the trade but the earliest and correct name for the species is actually Dracaena braunii Engler. The name Dracaena sanderiana was originally given to the variegated form of the species but it is only a cultivar. The plant is very easy to grow and has become a naturalized weed in Tropical Asia. Through shrewd marketing, they have managed to transform this weed into a lucrative cash crop. The plant rarely produces flowers in terminal racemes but the stems will branch after flowering. It does not die after flowering like a true bamboo.
Not all species of bamboo die after flowering, either. Lucky bamboo is decidedly un-lucky for us here in North America as Asian tiger mosquitoes have come in via the water-filled bags of cuttings.
I do sell this stuff at my work. And with experimenting with it, either or method works. From what ive read, and having also having the pleasure of talking to the distribuaters, I found out that it isnt aquatic or terrestrial. It is actually a bog plant for the most part. This is why it will grow in either or. Another reason for some dying in potting soil depends on how it was grown. More then 3/4 of the aquarium plants that we have in our tanks are in nature, bog plants or are semi submurged at times. So when they grow the plants they germinate them underwater but then they start to grow above the water. So when you put these plants into a fully aquatic enviroment, the plants seem to die. What actually happens is the leaves arent meant to be underwater so the plant sheds them and grows leaves that can pull CO2 out of the water instead of the air. Im not 100% sure that this happens with these plants, but if the "bamboo" plant you have was initialy grown in water, then transfered to soil, its root systems will not be adapted to getting nutrients from the soil, and then die. Some people get lucky with this as well ( no pun intented) and their plants grow just fine. Then again, it it was raised as a bog plant that is grown in soil but gets covered with water from time to time, it will have a more then likley chance to grow in the soil. People on here should try and root a cuting in soil and see how it grows initialy in it. Then root one in water, then switch them and see how this works. Might see some interesting results
Nonsense. I wouldn't believe anything the wholesale distributors say about the plant. They made up the whole "Feng Sui" silliness and they will obviously say anything to sell the plants. It may survive growing in water but it does not thrive growing that way. Cuttings will root in water but the plants grow best in soil. One doesn't typically root cuttings in soil anyway. Cuttings are best rooted in moist sand in a cutting bed. Dracaena braunii (D. sanderiana) is not native to Asia. It is originally from the Cameroon in western Africa and was introduced into cultivation in 1888 from plants collected by J. Braun sent to Berlin. It is now a naturalized weed in Asia and not restricted it boggy habitats. There is nothing "lucky" about the plant, nor is it an endemic Asiatic species, nor is it even a bamboo at all.
For transitioning a lucky bamboo from water to soil, I've always been very very successful with slowly introducing some soil to the vase (about a teaspoon at a time) over a period of months to get the roots used to the concept of dirt. Then, about six months after the first scoop of dirt, I can transplant the canes directly to a pot without getting any kind of shock in the plant.
Never said it couldnt be grown in soil, and i never said it was restricted to a bog enviroment. It lives next to rivers and or streams so it gets inundated with water for a period or time. Thats why its able to adapt to either water or soil. Once again, in my experience it depends on how they were grown initially. IF they were rooted in water initialy they will have trouble adjusting to soil and vice versa. Iorax.... definetly never thought of that. Sounds like a good idea.
It's good to be caution when moving any plant that's been living in water to soil. I was a little worried after the transfer but, it turned out ok. I was able to move two of these plants from their individual water vases straight into a big pot of semi moisture loving Syngoniums without any problems at all.