A fast, towering privacy screen that stays put — Alphonse Karr is a clumping bamboo, so it won't run wild through your yard.

Alphonse Karr (Bambusa multiplex 'Alphonse Karr') is a tropical clumping bamboo prized for its striking golden-yellow canes randomly striped with green, topped by airy, fine-textured evergreen foliage. It grows fast and tall, reaching 15 to 35 feet high while holding to a tidy clump just 6 to 10 feet wide. Because it clumps rather than runs, it gives you the dramatic height and quick coverage of bamboo without the aggressive spreading that gives running types their bad reputation. It's a natural for a living privacy wall, a tall screen along a fence line, or a bold tropical accent.

Why growers choose the Alphonse Karr

• Clumping, not running. It expands slowly outward from a tight clump instead of sending rhizomes across your yard, so no root barrier or trenching is required — the safe, low-worry way to grow bamboo.
• Fast, tall privacy. One of the quickest ways to put up a 15-plus-foot evergreen screen, filling in densely from the ground to the top.
• Year-round green. Evergreen in zones 8 to 10, it screens through every season rather than dropping bare in winter.
• Ornamental golden canes. Bright yellow culms streaked with green give it a decorative quality most screening plants can't match.
• Compact footprint. A mature width of only 6 to 10 feet means real height without taking over a narrow side yard or property line.

Use it as a privacy hedge or windscreen along a fence or property line, as a tropical specimen near a patio or pool, or in a large container on a deck or balcony where its golden canes can be enjoyed up close. Plant several in a row and the clumps knit into a tall, soft green wall.