Action
Briefing
Jun
2003 - Jul 2003
The Newsletter
of
Birmingham Friends of the
Earth
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Action
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The Newsletter
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War of the weeds
I have recently moved to Stirchley and cycle in to work regularly along the Rea Valley Route. I have noticed, as I imagine everyone else has, that there is a pernicious weed thrusting itself out of the soil in great clumps and slowly strangling all other plant life on the banks of the river. It’s Japanese Knotweed!
Japanese Knotweed inspires rage in many people. But why hate a plant, you ask? Because it spreads very quickly and easily, and creates a plant monoculture on our river bank that kills off other plant life, which of course has a knock-on effect on insect and bird life.
The Net is full of sites dedicated to its eradication, but many are despondent as people try and fail with different methods of removal. The scorched earth policy followed down on the Rea in places does not work. It kills off everything indiscriminately and then guess what? The first things to poke back up through the soil is more blasted Knotweed!
The important thing is NOT to dig it up. It can grow back from the tiniest fraction of rhizome (that’s a rooty sort of thing to the non-gardeners amongst us) and it’s actually illegal to move the stuff from one place to another as it’s classed as hazardous waste.
Instead, you can either cut it at ground level or, the Wildlife Trust assure me that the best way of getting rid of it is to bash it or roller it. That way the rhizome is fooled into thinking there’s still a thriving plant attached and keeps spending its energy on it, whereas if you cut it, it knows it’s gone and will just start a new shoot from the ground. Meanwhile, just beating the stuff up in situ is very satisfying AND removes the need to work out what to do with the resulting hazardous waste.
It seems you need to keep up the work over many growing seasons. Cut it down once and it will just come back again as soon as you lay down your secateurs. So just one season and you might as well knot have bothered.
It may help to paint biodegradable weedkillers on the cut stems, but this is beyond my knowledge and obviously there are serious implications of using weedkillers by rivers - so contact those in the know before pursuing this!
What really adds insult to injury is that the young stems look just like asparagus. In fact, I am amazed to hear that you can eat it. It tastes like rhubarb, apparently, but is only nice when the stems are young and fresh. However, you will have to cook it on a camping stove as moving the stuff is illegal!! I assume you can move it after you’ve eaten it.
Anyhow, we need concerted action to get rid of this vile weed. I wanted to tell you that I had phoned the Wildlife Trust, the Council and the local residents associations and organised Rea Valley Working Parties to get rid of it, but I’m afraid I’ve knot had time. Anyone else fancy taking on a “little” project?
I will certainly call the Council and see what they can do, but we must all be vigilant! If you don’t know what Japanese Knotweed looks like, find out. If you see it growing anywhere, panic! Then attack it with a large wooden mallet or garden roller - regularly - until its rhizomes give up and die in the ground. And if it’s knot on your property, contact the landowner - I’ve just found out that they have a legal obligation to do something about it if they have it on their land, because it is classed as a Notifiable Weed (feel that way myself sometimes) under the Wildlife Act of 1981.
However, while we’re at it, please note, a similar monoculture has been creeping into our high streets all over the country, and is similarly tenacious, pernicious and rage-inspiring.
Just as Knotweed is all cloned from one single plant, so the big chains are all cloned from global corporations. Just as Knotweed makes it impossible for the local plant life at its roots, and thus kills off the local insects and the local birds, so the big chain shops kill off the local independent shops around them and thus destroys the local economy. Just as Knotweed will come back again several growing seasons in a row until those of us out there with mallets and rollers are exhausted, so a big supermarket, refused planning permission, will apply again and again until the Council and local people are worn down and give in. I quote from a website on Japanese Knotweed: “When we moved into our house about 15 years ago I was very impressed by this stately looking plant and for the first five years dutifully fed it with all the good fertilizers I felt it deserved. I then discovered it’s true identity and since then have kept a long bladed knife by the front door and at every sighting of a new shoot, have leapt forth slashing, Samurai like, with suitable aggressive yells, cutting the growth to the ground. The growth nowadays is definitely weaker and the shoots thinner. (It’s also good fun).”
While I wouldn’t necessarily want to recommend this treatment for new chain shops appearing on your doorstep, we need to watch out for the signs of it spreading any further (applications for new supermarkets, pub takeovers, closing local shops) and take whatever action we can against it to eradicate this evil weed - or the monoculture of the banks of the River Rea will be mirrored in the economic monoculture of the streets of Birmingham....be vigilant!!
For more information on the evils of monoculture and how to combat it:
Food Uses
Japanese Knotweed has a tangy, tart
flavour similar to rhubarb, only better. The best plants to collect are the
stems 6 - 8" tall. Taller stems, up to 1 ft. tall, have a tough rind that
you must remove. Smaller plants provide less food. Be sure to discard all leaves,
which are too tough to eat. Slice the stems, steam them, or simmer them. They’re
tangy and tart, with a flavour similar to rhubarb, only better. If they’re
too strong-tasting for you straight, dilute the tartness by using them as one
ingredient out of many in a soup or stew. Like rhubarb, you can also use the
tart flavour of Japanese Knotweed to offset the sweetness of fruits in jams
or dessert dishes. Use about 10 times as much fruit as knotweed. I’ve made
terrific apple and knotweed pies using this proportion. You can sometimes even
substitute knotweed for lemon juice as the tart ingredient in a recipe, to transform
the familiar into the exotic.
For more recipes try: www.wildmanstevebrill.com/Plants.Folder/Knotweed.html
Karen Leach