The dual nature of Japanese Knotweed

It is a very tenacious plant. I had exactly one stalk grow to 3 feet in a mulched area of my yard. I didn&#x27;t think too much about it because I didn&#x27;t know what it was and hadn&#x27;t heard of it. While testing a trial of a plant identification application, I successfully identified it.<p>As someone loathe to use chemicals, I thought perhaps that the tenacity of the plant was overhyped, so I simply pulled the stalk out of the ground. Over the next several months, I&#x27;d notice 3-4 new stalks popping up each week over a roughly 15 foot radius area. That continued through the next spring when I finally decided enough was enough and got the glysophate.<p>From June through winter (I&#x27;m in the northeast US), I&#x27;d let a plant grow for a week or two and then spray it with the glysophate and leave the plant in place. I did this for the entirety of the following year as well. Now, in year 3, I finally have no more shoots popping up, and can&#x27;t begin to imagine what managing a true infestation looks like.

It&#x27;s stupidly irresponsible to encourage people to forage Japanese Knotweed in countries where it is a major threat to existing ecosystems. Even small fragments on shoes or in water can cause outbreaks. That&#x27;s why dealing with contaminated soil is extremely expensive.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;emmaplusthree.com&#x2F;home&#x2F;japanese-knotweed-understanding-its-spread-and-how-to-prevent-it&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;emmaplusthree.com&#x2F;home&#x2F;japanese-knotweed-understandi...</a>

I find it interesting that many permaculturists would include &quot;invasive&quot; species in their designs. (What makes something invasive has more to do with few, if any, ecological links to other species within the area). Anything from horseradish, asparagus, to autumn olives, sea buckthorne, jujube.<p>There&#x27;s a particular case of the Tree of Heaven, an aggressive tree species that can live on land polluted by copper tailings. They get everywhere, grow back more prolific if you tried pulling them, and do not have a pleasant odor. The mayor of Jerome, AZ seeded them to help stop erosion in Jerome. And it worked.<p>Even running bamboo can be managed -- the key is to consistently harvest the edible sprouts.<p>This demonstrates the power of regeneration in living systems, be they ecologies or individual plants. It&#x27;s aligning this regenerative power with the interests of human civilization that can restore wastelands, reverse desertification, while yielding something useful for humans.

Previous owner of my property planted this damn plant here in two separate patches.<p>I&#x27;m on year four trying to get rid of it and it&#x27;s still showing signs of vitality. If I let my guard down, it&#x27;s gonna be back with a vengeance in a year or two.<p>I dug out about 600 kg of roots from about 6 square meter area and have culled every shoot every day from the patch almost every day for four years.<p>The other patch was first treated with herbicide and then covered it with a light blocking tarp made for this purpose. It&#x27;s still going after 4 years in the dark.<p>Please do not pick it up or mess with it. It is a terrible plant and destroys everything around it.

I had almost half an acre of this crap on my property, and still have about a quarter of an acre after thoroughly removing one big patch. There is nothing good about Japanese knotweed in the US, and everyone who forages it is part of the problem. It evolved on the sides of volcanoes, so if you cut anything off of it (or burn it), it triggers a chemical signal that encourages virulent growth from the attached rhizome. By cutting down small amounts of it, you are actually propagating it. That is the furthest thing from &quot;environmental stewardship.&quot;

When you get to the point where you realize a herbicide might be nice, but aren’t set up for spraying or dealing with potential drift (droplet size is important, a mist means chemical is floating away to touch something you don’t want), look into stem injectors which is a common method to limit risk. Keep in mind timing will be important though.<p>As always, take the PPE notice on the label seriously (sit down and read the entire damn thing), and always wear chemical resistant gloves and a splash guard for the face.

This thing is incredibly invasive and is all over the Northwest and other parts of America near waterways. It spreads underground like bamboo. It’s super expensive to get rid of, because it you have to fight it for many years consistently for it to die out. And even then you may just be unlucky enough for it to spread into the area again from some adjacent area or from fragments in the water.

Here in the UK, it&#x27;s considered incredibly bad news because it destroys the foundations of houses, and is well-nigh impossible to eradicate.

It just occurred to me - we only call these &#x27;invasive&#x27; not because they invade nature, but because they invade the spaces we as humans have carved into nature. If our presence wasn&#x27;t there, perhaps the natural ecosystem wouldn&#x27;t have space or room for some of these species to enter, but because of human activity, a space is carved out for these other species to grow in, and that&#x27;s what causes us the stress.<p>Isn&#x27;t it weird how we&#x27;re so acutely aware of the effect of the species that invade our space, but so ignorant so often of our effect on the same spaces when we invade them?<p>I think I learned something valuable today chewing on this article.