Japanese Knotweed is a highly invasive plant which can actually cause extensive damage to a property and the land around it.

On development sites Japanese knotweed can delay the construction process by several months and even years. The plant has an extensive rhizome system. This rhizome system can extend by seven meters laterally from the visible invasive knotweed plant, and the rhizome can extend by three meters deep, sometime further.

A spectacular spread of the invasive plant can be obtained by disturbing the soil, as fragments of the plant’s rhizome weighing less than 1 gram will regenerate into new infestations, growing to a height of around three meters in only one growing season. As a result the infestations by that plant are increasingly found throughout the United Kingdom, Europe and America, and as this invasive weed does not have any natural predators, the problem of Japanese knotweed control is escalating to the extent that the estimated cost of Japanese knotweed eradication within the United Kingdom could be between £1.5 - 2.6 billion.

When needing Japanese knotweed solutions, it is always best to contact a Japanese knotweed specialist that will have all the necessary tools to fight and exterminate the plant.

The knotweed is listed under the Schedule 9 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, making it an offence to cause or allow it to spread in the wild.

Due to the legislative regime and highly invasive nature of Japanese knotweed, ignoring the problem is not an option.

Careful management of infested Japanese knotweed material is required to prevent the weed from spreading. The volume of infested material can be surprisingly large due the extent of horizontal and vertical penetration of the rhizome system into the soil. The Japanese knotweed treatment options fall into two categories - in situ treatment or physical removal of all viable rhizomes.

Using herbicide as a treatment can be the most economic approach. At best this form of Japanese knotweed control will take one growing season to complete, for which the ground needs to be undisturbed, in a safe location.
Situations where the above conditions for control are not met reduce the efficacy of any herbicide treatment. Complete Japanese knotweed eradication of all viable rhizomes can be achieved but can not be fully verified. The infested Japanese knotweed soil, even after treatment, remains classified as “controlled waste” so post treatment management is required to make sure that the invasive plant does not comes back.