0DRLddMMyyyy0Falseen-USTrue Posted October 12, 2005 Share Posted October 12, 2005 As I have already mentioned my neighbours have the wretched plant in their garden along a fence.It is slwly coming into mine. I know of its problems and what damage it causes from reading english websites. Can anyone tell me are there legal restrictions to growing it here. Can anyone tell me of a french website that might explain the problem to them. My french isn't anywhere near good enough to explain to my neighbours why they ought not to grow the stuff. Molly Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Russethouse Posted October 12, 2005 Share Posted October 12, 2005 Do they really grow it or have just got it and have surrendered ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tresco Posted October 15, 2005 Share Posted October 15, 2005 'Can anyone tell me are there legal restrictions to growing it here'.If there are, the gardeners at the Jardin Publique in Bordeaux don't know about them. They have a fine healthy clump in it's own nicely tended bed If anyone can suggest a website/article that explains the full horror of JP in French I would be grateful too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ty Korrigan Posted October 15, 2005 Share Posted October 15, 2005 The silly bstrds in Pontivy 56 were growing Giant hogweed on a roundabout not more than 30m from the Blavet river and Nantes Brest Canal!It loves to have its seeds flushed down the drain and into watercourses where it can dominate mankind with its perniciousness and noxiousness...Then they dug it up all of a sudden just after it flowered so I stopped flinching each time I passed it in my van.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iceni Posted October 15, 2005 Share Posted October 15, 2005 Just to cheer you up I 'think' that there have been cases of Giant Hogweed actually seeding with Japaneese Knotweed. We bought a house with knotweed some 4 houses away - our gardening friend said MOVE. In three years we had no choice, it was all around us and the rats found it great for living in - yuck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ty Korrigan Posted October 15, 2005 Share Posted October 15, 2005 I was recently a student at a Horticultural College back in the 53rd state and a one lecturer talked about research into the possibility of Fallopia japonica (knotweed) crossing with the (Russian creeper) Fallopia aubertii The resulting cross would be a vine that could push through anything man could put in its way at more than 250 lbs per square inch combined with a phenominal growth rate measured in meters per week...Be afraid... be very afraid... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Motorhead Posted October 16, 2005 Share Posted October 16, 2005 The Day of the Triffids beckons. Really I think this horticultural lecturer chappie was talking mince.It is possible for two separate species within the same genus to breed together eg horse/donkey or lion/tiger but the resulting progeny are what is termed as "unviable" ie they can't breed any further themselves eg mules are infertile Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ty Korrigan Posted October 16, 2005 Share Posted October 16, 2005 Ah! but Motorhead my friend... Fallopia japonica is spread not by seeds as they are mostly infertile but by small pieces of root! They are all geneticaly the same and it is this which makes it incredibly difficult to eradicate as its root systems are enormous. In the U.K the regulations for the control of this pest require that huge amounts of contaminated soil must be removed and buried in a special landfill site more than 3m deep. Its most commonly spread by the vehicles used for public works such as road building.It came from Japan where it grows on the side of volcanoes in a very harsh enviroment. There it has over 70 pathogens and animals that feed on it to control it. Here it finds itself in a temperate heaven and only half a dozen enemies not including man!Elm trees rarely set viable seed and thus most Elms in our hedges are geneticaly the same, just propagated by root suckering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Motorhead Posted October 16, 2005 Share Posted October 16, 2005 Point taken Ty.But if all or most of this weed is genetically similar it shouldn't be too difficult to create a disease to kill it eg think of dutch elm disease. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iceni Posted October 16, 2005 Share Posted October 16, 2005 Motorhead, take a quick search on the net and you will see just how much research is going on to try to find a pest that will take out JK and not wreak havoc on everything else - just think of the nice cane toad problem in OZ when they tried to kill a beetle which affected the sugar cane.In my part of Essex, we used to watch as the council contractors cleared banks, put the whole lot through the chopping machine and then it went back to the compost making site which then sold the compost off in bags - guess what was growing on the banks - yup loads of JK.The AW contractors used to cut it down by the side of the water culvert that ran into the river colne, pick up as much as they could and put it into lorries and cover the surface with black plastic and stones - we would watch the mass of bits and bobs float down to the river as of course unless you put a barrier between the plants and the water it has this wonderful ability to break apart and just a few cells will root.Here it seems they use in along major river banks to stop them eroding and it seems to work. The spread does not seem anywhere near as bad as the UK but in my book, one tiny weeny plant is enough to put me off properties within a 5 km radius.There is some very good research being done in Wales - I think details are on the UK gov site. It is very very scary.Just be grateful we do not have kudzu, this is in the southern states of the US and just takes the whole place over - they have not found a way of stopping it yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pinkfluff<P>Big Wet Drops and Lots of Them, Are a Sure Sign of Rain!<P> Posted October 16, 2005 Share Posted October 16, 2005 Japanese knotweed horrible stuff the wifes daughter has a house next to the canal and I saw a piece of knotweed floating in it at the side, when I went back a month later the thing had tripled in size so i pulled it out and it was not even connected to the bottom of the canal so it had the ability to grow floating we had some at the back of our resturant and it broke through concrete I kept putting commercial weed killers on it and never destroyed it in three years Its so bad I started respecting it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Russell 23Russell Posted October 31, 2005 Share Posted October 31, 2005 We bought in Creuse last Christmas and found knotweed on our July trip although there was no sign of it at Easter or a year ago September when we viewed. During our summer visit we cut down all the shoots, some up to 7ft high, and poured 50/50 weedkiller into each stem. We now have many blackened and very dead looking stumps with only a small amount of regrowth. These were sprayed twice last week as the stems were too small for injection, so we are hoping that as it is only a small infection we can beat it. We are hampered by only being able to visit 3 times a year at the moment. One reason for optimism is that one particularly large stem had started to grow a side shoot after being cut down and treated (7cm in less than a week) but is now dead (well it appears to be dead!). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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