First of all clarify that the bamboo of luck is not bamboo. It is the Dracaena sanderiana, a plant that although it is mostly cultivated in a hydroponic way there is no problem in cultivating it in soil.
In China it is very common to give away lucky bamboo when a house is opened or a business is started. Generally the lucky bamboo that we find in the market comes from Taiwan and China with the interlaced or spiral shape that their growers usually give there.
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| source pic: pinterest.com |
Lucky bamboo needs sifted light since it is a plant that grows under tropical forests. It can be grown even in the shade without any inconvenience. What you should never receive is direct sun because its leaves would burn. It needs temperatures between 15 and 32ºC, making it an ideal plant for indoor cultivation. We can have it in a vase with stones and some water, without chlorine, indefinitely. In this case we will change the water once a week. And don't be scared, the roots of Dracaena sanderiana are red.
If we grow it on land it doesn't need much water. More or less its maintenance is like that of a yucca since it is an agavácea. Fertilization will consist of adding a few drops to the irrigation water once a month. If we have them in water with a few drops every two months it will be enough. The spiral shape with which we know the lucky bamboo is not achieved with a guided bonsai type but by rotating the plant so that it follows a light source. As you can imagine, it is a very slow process that requires a lot of perseverance.
The most common problems that lucky bamboo usually presents are mealybugs and fungi. The first we will remove with a cotton ball soaked with alcohol and leaf spots produced by fungi with a fungicide. If a plant grows excessively along we can prune it in spring.
