I have lucky bamboo that I've had for several years. It's been repotted (by repotted, I mean put into a new container, no soil, sorry to confuse! Its in rocks and water only, just like it was when I bought it) twice and done very well. It went from just the stalks to having shoots. But, lately, it's looking...sad. It isn't a green as it was and it's kinda droopy. Also, the ends of some of the shoots are turning brown. What's going on? Help!

I also have a lucky bamboo that I have had for many years...sitting in a vase of water and stones. No soil. I read on a website when I first got the bamboo that they can survive in soil, but it's very difficult to successfully grow them that way. Keeping them in water is supposedly the best and easiest way to keep them.

It may help to understand that lucky bamboos are nothing more than Dracaena sanderiana cuttings rooting in water. Like any other water-rooted cutting they can be kept in water or they can be transferred to soil.

If they are kept in plain water, they tend to last for about a year or so before they gradually start to deteriorate because they are not getting any nutrients. Adding a tiny amount of fertilizer to the water can sometimes help. Make sure that you use filtered or distilled water if your tap water is on the hard side.

If you transfer the cuttings to a pot, then the potting mix will provide the nutrients that they need. With proper potting, light, and water, the cuttings can grow quite large as a rooted plant.

It is interesting how much confusion there is about lucky bamboo simply because they are sold as cuttings in water rather than as potted plants.