"new shoots throughout the summer"

no, the shooting is in your spring only. Then the shoots take 2 - 3 months to reach full height, sprout branches + leaves.

You may also see shoots that abort.

You may see some whipshoots in early fall as rhizomes grow and sometimes break the surface.

Constantly wet soil would damage the roots and then the plant will show rolled up leaves.

thanks for the input - guess i'm just having a hard time getting a feel for how wet is too wet when it comes to the bed's soil. been getting up very early and the plants look good in the morning, dry in the middle of the day. as long as i don't see any brown in the leaves or culms, i'm going to keep the soil wet and see how it goes since the plants seem to be doing much better than last month when i watered far less (for fear of causing damage via wet soil)....

- j

Continuously moist, damp soil is the goal. Most plants love and wil sow maximum growth, even the non-thirsty, drought-tolerant plans.

OTOH, water-logged/saturated/boggy soil will drown most plants.

If your soil drains well, then drowning plants is not much of concern, esp mature plants.

When I was overwatering a young B. tuldoides, the symptom was numerous yellow/brown leaves. I removed those leaves, cut back on watering until the leaves curled from dryness, and started watering less. The plant never showed any more yellow leaves. It has so many culms and so much foliage to support with moisture now, I figure I couldnt overwater it if I tried.

My B. tuldoides is my favorite bamboo, sized up fast, in one year, and is a vigorous producer of culms every summer, with larger leaves than any of my Phyllostachys.

Next favorite is Mexican weeping, for a very different, delicate, "gracilis" bamboo look.