Stems are round, reddish-purple, smooth and have a bamboo-like appearance. Leaves are ovate with a flat base, reaching inches long and inches wide with pointed tips.
Flowers are greenish-white. Fruit is small and white with wings that help to disperse seeds to new sites. Seeds are brown and shiny. What You Can Do Learn how to identify Japanese knotweed and how to avoid accidentally spreading this invasive plant through its root fragments and seeds.
This is especially important if you are planning to do work in an area which contains Japanese knotweed. Learn how to effectively manage Japanese knotweed on your property. The guide to Best Management Practices for Japanese knotweed describes the most effective and environmentally safe control practices for this species. Never buy or plant Japanese knotweed. It is against the law to buy, sell, trade, propagate or purposely grow Japanese knotweed.
Stay on designated trails and keep pets on a leash. Leaving trails or entering areas containing Japanese knotweed can encourage the spread of this plant. When leaving an area containing Japanese knotweed, inspect, clean and remove mud, seeds and plant parts from clothing, pets and horses , vehicles including bicycles and ATVs , and equipment such as mowers and tools.
Although once sold through seed and plant catalogs, by the lates knotweed was already being viewed as a problematic pest. The plant, which can grow from three to 15 feet tall, has bamboo-like stems and is sometimes called Japanese bamboo. As with many invasive plants, knotweed thrives in disturbed areas and once established can spread rapidly, creating monoculture stands that threaten native plant communities. Japanese knotweed can tolerate deep shade, high temperatures, high soil salinity and drought.
It is commonly found along streams and rivers, in low-lying areas, disturbed areas such as rights-of-way, and around old home and farmsteads. Japanese knotweed can be found in the U. It is also in eight Canadian Provinces. The plant is an upright, shrubby, herbaceous, woody-appearing perennial reaching heights of 10 to 15 feet 3 to 4.
The stems are smooth, stout, and hollow. Where the leaves attach to the stem, the stem is swollen with a membranous sheath surrounding the joints. The leaves are broadly ovate broad and rounded at the base and tapering toward the end , 3 to 6 inches 8 to 15 cm long by 2 to 4 inches 5 to 10 cm wide, alternating on stem, broadly oval to somewhat triangular or heart-shaped, pointed at the tip. Japanese knotweed is a contentious plant that can depreciate the value of a property and cause conflict between neighbours.
The invasive plant is known for spreading quickly and for monopolising gardens. Japanese Knotweed damage can be severe as the plant can damage property foundations, flood defences and walls. Knotweed grows in large patches that can quickly push out any other competing plant life.
Thankfully, Japanese knotweed is easy to identify , so homeowners can waste no time in getting a treatment plan in place to get rid of the plant. Japanese knotweed is from Eastern Asia. The plant originated from Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan. During Spring, the plants leaves are normally rolled up and dark green or red in colour. Japanese Knotweed is often wrongly identified as other common UK garden weeds as the plant shares many similar characteristics to common UK shrubs, weeds and plants such as Lilac, Dogwood, Red Bistors and Buckwheat.
Often confused with many other common weeds, Japanese Knotweed is frequently wrongly identified throughout the UK. For a thorough, in-depth look at how to identify Japanese Knotweed, including many Japanese Knotweed pictures, check out our complete guide to Japanese Knotweed identification. Japanese knotweed is originally from Japan and is also native to China and Korea. The plant is one of many species of plants that have been discovered to be growing on the side of volcanoes. In its native land, Japanese knotweed can reproduce naturally and also benefits from a prodigious underground system of rhizomes.
In its native environment, knotweed is kept in check by natural predators in the form of fungi and insects, not to mention other plants and an environment that can be much more hostile than the United Kingdom. The plant was originally discovered by Dutch naturalist Maarten Houttuyn in the 18th-Century, he named it Reynoutria japonica, a name which it still goes by today.
Unfortunately, the records of this original discovery were lost for some time, so when more European botanists started exploring Japan some years later, the plant was rediscovered and given a new name by a Bavarian botanist, Phillip von Siebold. Siebold and his partner Zuccarini, named the plant Polygonum cuspidatum. Since , knotweed has spread across Great Britain with areas of high concentration found in Bristol, Nottingham, Rotherham and Glasgow. Philip von Siebold brought Japanese knotweed to the UK in , unaware of the impact that it would go on to have on the environment.
At the time, botany and the cultivation of plants was a popular interest of the upper classes. Botanist like Siebold would be able to fund their research trips by sending their discoveries back to nurseries on the European continent, where they would then be cultivated and sold onto commercial nurseries or botanical gardens around the world.
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