I BOUGHT some lucky bamboo plants during Chinese New Year, but they have turned yellow and brown. Is it because I placed them in the wrong location, as I hear fengshui is important for such plants? How should I take care of them to make them last?

It is important to place the lucky bamboo in a spot that gets filtered sunshine. Although it is often regarded as an indoor plant, don't forget that all green plants require sunlight to make food (via photosynthesis).

The symptoms you have described - turning yellow and brown - suggest that the plants lack sunshine.

Given sufficient sunshine and a little water-soluble fertiliser dissolved into the vase of water, the lucky bamboo will last indefinitely, except that the stems will not twist naturally.

This question, published in The Straits Times on February 23, 2008, were answered by Mr Wilson Wong,
founder of Green Culture Singapore (www.greenculturesg.com), a local website for plant lovers..

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