Old tyres as makeshift/temporary pots?

[justin venter]

Hi all, a little advice please.
Would it be more beneficial for a bamboo plant to spend approx. 2 growing seasons in large poly bag filled with potting mix or in recycled tyres filled with same mix? I ask because at the moment I have the benefit of space to keep a number of large cuttings from various digs, the situation may change in the near future and I may only have a month or so to move the collection of plants.
It some how seems a better option in my mind to have large root balls temporarily growing in old tyres with the benefit if any of being 'in the ground', and could be bagged up when its time to move?
Plants will be irrigated by hose winter and summer.

This experiment will also serve to test Aurea bamboo against dry winters with small amounts of frost with temp. down to -5C/23F.

Anybody with similar dry, frosty winter conditions.

50gal bag VS tyre pot?

[Alan_L]

I've not tried it before, but it seems to me that getting the plant out of the tires after 2 seasons would be a real challenge. It would require cutting the tires off but not damaging the rhizomes that will (hopefully) be circling around. Also, the bottoms will be open to the soil below? Rhizomes will probably escape into the soil, or at least you'll have roots going down there, so at transplant time you'll be hacking off roots, and will probably need to reduce the leaf load a bit when you do.

Do you have machinery to move these? A 50-gal bag will be *heavy*. I'd also be concerned about rhizomes puncturing and poking through into sunlight (and turning into whip shoots) or getting into the ground.

[dependable]

One benefit of tires would be you could pick them up to move with pallet forks on machine. The bags might break apart. Might be hard to get out of tires, as Alan mentioned. Once you get to steel belted part, they are pretty hard to cut. Sawzall w metal/demo blade will do it, but it is slow going.

[jd.]

Would it be more beneficial for a bamboo plant to spend approx. 2 growing seasons in large poly bag filled with potting mix or in recycled tyres filled with same mix?

Tires have better drainage due to the big hole in the middle.
Tires are more durable and will not get torn up by movement and weather like a relatively thin plastic bag.
Tires are more portable, being ready to roll.

However, extraction may be complicated if a tire-pot is cut with a concave lip rather than trimmed evenly to the sides. When potting a bamboo, you may optionally place a ramp flush with one side of the pot that can be lifted out to ease future removal.

Also, a bamboo will begin to anchor itself into the ground unless kept over an impervious surface such as a pad made of stone, concrete, brick, or metal.

This experiment will also serve to test Aurea bamboo against dry winters with small amounts of frost with temp. down to -5C/23F.

While bad for a tropical bamboo, that temperature seems relatively friendly for a temperate Phyllostachys bamboo like aurea. That said, a bamboo is always better able to tolerate freezing with its roots in the ground or otherwise insulated.