Knotweed

[troy ap De skog]

we all want rid of it... but i for one know that these little insects realy are not the answer... derfa's sci nerds are being dumb..


my veiw is plant lots of hemp and hops in and around large patches of knotweed, as chemicals released by members of hemp family seem to reduce the growth and kill knotweed.
reasons for my idea...
hops are NATIVE
hemp is a plant easy to manage/ conrtoll than insects
hops and hemp are not paracitic, were as insect nymphs are.
hops and hemp are not going to possably attack native plants...


whats your veiws?

 

[Tony]

For a second i thought that was the answer to my request for knotweed recipies and I thought...."here we go"!

I get what you're saying and it does make sense, how well do hops and hemp grow in our climate, especially compared to the knotweed.

i have a couple of patches of the stuff and it would be nice to get rid of it, at the moment the whole area is under black sheeting.

 

[Toddy]

I was speaking with a Herptologist (lizards and newts) the other week and I asked her about eradicating knotweed since the site is a wildlife haven. Her response was that there's now a safe weedkiller that will destroy the knotweed but cause no problems for anything else, even amphibians in the water course next to the knotweed

Contact Defra for details I was advised.

cheers,
M

 

[SOAR]

This might be of interest to you,

http://www.bspp.org.uk/publications/new-disease-reports/ndr.php?id=019049

 

[Toddy]

Oh very good
Thank you for the link
Wonder if the knotweed could become a preferred species for this attack ?

cheers,
Toddy

 

[SOAR]

It does infect others, can be found on Limes. (witches broom)

http://www.apsnet.org/pd/searchnotes/2007/PDIS-91-4-0466C.asp

 

[SOAR]

Doubt it will be the end of the dreaded stuff though, for that you need to inject the shoots with chemical.

 

[troy ap De skog]

Tony:
well hops and hemp both grow well in the british climate...
hemp as from the same climate zone at britan, and hops because it a vine that grows all over the UK..

unfortunely as the disease could also infect other trees as well as citrus lime, so that dosnt fill me with glee.

i just think all non native plants should be band from entering the country, and people should be given insentive to have there garnden full only native plants...
this way this sort of problem sould not be as likly in the feuture...

 

[gregorach]

Hops do not grow well much further north than Central Scotland. Traditionally, Scottish beers used fairly low hopping rates, as the hops needed to be imported from England. There is now one very small area of commercial hop growing in the Clyde Valley. I know a number of craft brewers who grow their own hops up here, but they don't fare well in bad years and I've never heard of it being done successfully much further north than Fife. And even under good conditions, they need a lot of care and maintenance to grow well, as they're highly susceptible to all sorts of pests and diseases.

Oh, and hops aren't native - they were introduced from the continent in the early 15th century. Although there are some references to hops having been first introduced by the Romans, they certainly weren't widespread. The first "modern" hop garden in England was planted in 1428, and it was very controversial.

If you want to ban "all non native plants", you can kiss goodbye to most of our crops too - even wheat, oats and barley were originally introduced. You'll have to pry my tomatoes, potatoes, squashes and sweetcorn out of my cold dead hands, but try and take my hops and my malting barley, and I'll return from the grave to wreak a terrible vengeance...

Thanks, but I think I'd rather trust "derfa's sci nerds".

 

[Toddy]

Yep, and it's illegal to grow hemp without a Home Office licence, too.

I have come across the dreaded knotweed from bog to mountain, forest and field to shore. It grows taller in our fertile soils than it does in it's original environment according to a local Japanese lady, and thus it outcompetes nettles, brambles, dockens, umbellifleurs.....the usual weeds.
If heavily grazed it doesn't spread though.

cheers,
Toddy

 

[Nice65]

we all want rid of it... but i for one know that these little insects realy are not the answer... derfa's sci nerds are being dumb..


my veiw is plant lots of hemp and hops in and around large patches of knotweed, as chemicals released by members of hemp family seem to reduce the growth and kill knotweed.
reasons for my idea...
hops are NATIVE

I think hemp may be native aswell, I know it used to grow wild here.

 

[gregorach]

Hemp originates in Central Asia. It's not entirely clear when it was first introduced to the UK, but there is evidence for hemp cultivation in England during the latter part of the first millennium.

 

[troy ap De skog]

well hops have been in the uk and its "local" ecozone(europe) long enough to be consiered native as they intract with the local ecology with unmeasurable ecological impacts... aka, our bugs and stuff eat it.. ........

can we just make it illeage to plant/ bring forgein plants in(to) the uk... that have not been self seeding in the wild of the uk for more than 1000 years

save these problem in the feuture.....
or is me this me just being a grumpy young person...

 

[gregorach]

can we just make it illeage to plant/ bring forgein plants in(to) the uk... that have not been self seeding in the wild of the uk for more than 1000 years

Still excludes out all those lovely New World crops like potatoes, tomatoes and maize. That's about half my allotment.

I'm all for improving bio-security, but we need to try and be reasonable about it.

 

[SOAR]

One problem with the stuff is that there is alot of land in this country that is not kept, wasteland and open spaces, the other is the fact that it grows and spreads like mad in our soils, keeping it out of your garden is one thing, getting rid of it from acres of land is another, the forestry commision have a job controling the likes of knotweed, hog weed and Himalayan balsam and at an expenssive cost with chemical control.