The Best Tools for Removing Bamboo

You ask, we answer: what tools do we use to remove bamboo?

The list is fairly simple. We use hand saws, loppers, and sometimes a chainsaw to cut the canes. Below ground, we use pickaxes, shovels, mechanical saws, power hammers, digging bars, and spades to cut and pry through the rhizomes. We also leverage full size and dump trucks, because everything we remove has to go somewhere.

The process is straightforward to describe. Doing it is another matter. Bamboo removal takes manual labor, experience, hauling capacity, and grit.

Bamboo species and varieties can vary significantly in cane size and growth habit. Larger, thicker canes often come with a more substantial bamboo planting and can add to the cutting, handling, and removal work.

We start by cutting the canes into lengths we can handle. For thinner canes, a hand saw or loppers may be enough. We use a chainsaw where it makes sense for larger material. Once the canes are down, we load them into the truck, rake and blow off the area, and get a clearer look at the ground.

Then the real work begins.

We often start with a shallow trench around the main cluster to see where the running rhizomes are going. That first trench is for inspection; it doesn’t tell us that everything is only six inches deep. We cut the runners we find, keep digging, and adjust once we can see what’s below the surface. Running bamboo spreads through an underground rhizome network, so cutting down the canes alone doesn’t remove the plant.

From there, we work through the main cluster with pickaxes, spades, shovels, and digging bars. We cut and pry it into chunks large enough to avoid unnecessary cutting but small enough for the crew to lift and load. Sometimes a bigger piece saves time. Sometimes it’s too heavy, and we have to break it down again. You make that call while you’re standing over it with the tool in your hands.

**Cutting bamboo canes down is usually the easy part. Clearing the surrounding vegetation, exposing the soil, and removing the underground rhizome system is where much of the difficult labor begins.**

Every cluster is different. Some canes are thin and the ground opens up fairly easily. Others sit on top of a thick, tangled mass of rhizomes and soil. The soil matters too. So do fences, gravel, hardscape, neighboring plants, and the space available to move material out. A bamboo hedge tucked between a house and a fence is a different job from a cluster with room for an excavator.

We’ve tried different tools on difficult sites: reciprocating saws, demolition hammers, hedge trimmers, and just about anything that can cut or break material apart. Some help in the right spot.

There isn’t one tool that solves every bamboo job. Most of our residential projects still come down to people using hand tools, cutting and prying the cluster apart piece by piece.

Some homeowners cut bamboo to the ground and try treating the remaining plant with herbicide. Established bamboo can be persistent, and cutting alone should not be confused with complete removal. For projects where the goal is physical removal, excavating the targeted rhizome system provides a cleaner reset.

You also have to pay attention to what’s around the bamboo. Rhizomes may run near a tree you want to keep, through a gravel bed, or across a property line. Buried utilities and irrigation lines change how you can dig. Those conditions need to be checked before anyone starts swinging a pickaxe. A pipe beneath bamboo can make excavation much more complicated.

Excavator access made this bamboo removal substantially less labor-intensive. Machinery can handle much of the heavy excavation, but hand tools are still useful for detailed work around edges, obstacles, and remaining rhizomes.

A lot of bamboo around Seattle was planted for privacy. I understand why. It grows into a tall screen, and a homeowner may enjoy that screen for years. With running bamboo, though, the work can build quietly underground. By the time the shoots appear along a fence or in a neighbor’s yard, the original hedge may have become a much larger removal project. It can feel like a ticking time bomb.

The runners away from the main cluster are often more approachable than the dense center, but they still take investigation. We may need to trench along the spread to find out where they go. That’s one reason I can’t price every bamboo job by looking only at the canes above ground.

**A dump truck loaded with bamboo canes—the first stage of the removal process. Once the visible growth is cleared and hauled away, the crew can begin exposing and excavating the underground rhizomes.**

And then there’s hauling. Cutting the canes is often the easy part. The chunks coming out of the ground can contain bamboo, roots, and a lot of soil. Someone has to lift each piece and move it to the truck, and haul it away. On a large job, truck capacity and disposal are part of the project, not an afterthought.

This bamboo removal covered approximately 500 square feet. Excavator access made the excavation much more efficient, but the project still generated a large amount of material that had to be loaded, hauled, and disposed of appropriately.

Can you try this yourself? Absolutely. If it’s a small, accessible patch, get the right tools and spend a day seeing what’s under the surface. You may be able to save yourself a substantial amount of money. Just plan for the weight of the material and where it will go. Be especially careful when the bamboo is near utilities, structures, or plants you want to keep.

A lot of customers decide they would rather hire our crew than buy tools for a job they may only do once. We can bring the people, tools, and trucks to cut the canes, work through the rhizomes, haul the material, and tidy the space.

If there are other invasive plants or cleanup work in the yard, we can address those within the project scope too.

Bamboo rhizomes had become entangled around the rockery and fence posts on this property. The crew carefully worked around these obstacles to remove the targeted rhizomes, and a new fence was installed after the bamboo work was completed.

That’s how we remove bamboo. The steps sound simple: cut, trench, dig, pry, load, and haul. The difficult part is doing each step on the property in front of you, with whatever is buried there, and keeping at it until the heavy work is done.

Field note: Before cutting bamboo, look at access, nearby plants and utilities, and where the waste will go. The canes are the visible part. The digging and hauling determine the job.