Bamboo

Our backyard has a clump of bamboo which rather cleverly hides a neglected building behind it. The building is on the neighbouring property and, depending on my mood, I sometimes think it’s reminiscent of stone buildings found in intricate European city alleyways — the colour and cracks of the brickwork hold some appeal. On other days, I’m horrified at the state of the wall and peer upwards to see the bottom half made of old brick giving way to a top half hastily cobbled together with fibro sheets.

We decided in the end that it was best to cover it, so we planted bamboo. It’s growing well, and after a few years, I can’t even really remember what it looked like before.

Bamboo Mites

Sadly, I discovered a minor issue: we appear to have an infestation of what’s called bamboo spider mites.

As a novice gardener, I didn’t even realise there was a problem. I thought some of the foliage going a bit brown was just a sign of the time of year as we headed into autumn. But when I inspected it a little more closely and turned a few leaves over, I saw that it was, in fact, a bug infestation.

Some googling helped me diagnose the issue, and I wish I had discovered it earlier — by the time I realised, it had spread to a fair amount of the plant. I decided to try spraying it with some OCP Eco-Oil. The oil prohibits the mites from breeding and feeding and should stop the infestation from spreading. It’s possible that the onset of winter might have naturally reduced their numbers, but I didn’t want to take any chances.
2025
April 18th
The sun is out, and so was I — Eco-Oil in hand. I gave the bamboo a second going-over and will now wait to see the response. The infestation is quite large, and I’m annoyed at myself for not picking it up sooner, but hopefully the oil, combined with the cooler weather, will help diminish their presence.
April 17th
I had planned to re-spray today, but a little rain was forecast — and you need 24 hours of no rain after spraying — so I’ll tackle it tomorrow.
April 13th
I got to work and sprayed the infected area. The most difficult part is that you have to spray not only the top but also the underside of the leaves, as that’s where the mites predominantly live. The instructions say to spray the area and then re-spray it in 4–5 days.