I have been looking at Pleioblastus fortunei as a candidate for a dappled-shaded, backyard hillside; however, the info on the web is all over the place. Depending on the site, it grows all of 12" tall or 4 feet tall. It prefers partial to deep shade or, on other sites, full sun to look its best. It is a running bamboo - but no! it is a well-behaved clumper (some sites split the difference and claim it is a runner that stays in bounds (?!)). I checked ATP's database (the one I have come to trust) but there are only a handful of photos. The photos really are quite beautiful, but I am in need of data I can trust. Does anyone have any personal experience with Pleioblastus fortunei that they can share? Many, many thanks in advance :).

To help people from having to search, here is the plant in our database:

Dwarf Whitestripe Bamboo (Pleioblastus fortunei)

, Dave!

ATP member @Zencat is listed as having this plant, maybe she could help with information?

Oh, that would be nice! Thank you, Lin, for putting out the call There just seems to be so much conflicting information out there and 2 of the sites that disagree are sites that I would normally have a lot of faith in

Da da da! To the rescue! Lol

For me, this is a well behaved plant. It clumps and stays short, about 15" or so.



It started out in a 4" pot 6 years ago. It mostly stays evergreen but it's right up against the house where it's much warmer. You can see where it has spread a bit but that also may be because of the general site.

Thank you so much for responding! If you don't mind, may I ask a couple of more questions? I see that you are in zone 7 - do you think that that has anything to do with its height? Also, are you growing yours in sun or part shade or ??? Again, thank you for responding - I really appreciate getting some real-world info on these guys.

I don't have enough info to answer about height. I suppose it's possible that in a warmer climate it could get taller and spread more. Mine is on the north side of the house in mostly shade.

And I just noticed I need to clean out the dead leaves.

Thank you for all of the help! I went ahead and ordered some for the hillside so I guess I will find out how it does in this climate. Hopefully, it will stay on the shorter side like yours

I didn't even notice the leaves. I did, however, read on a bamboo site that you should not clean out the leaves as they provide the nice, cool mulch that the bamboo prefers

The gravel keeps it pretty cool there but that's good to know. Thanks!