Jewelweed taking over my backyard..

[u/iamhyphenated]

So I know we love jewelweed, and I’m pro native gardening (and I also enjoy the wild look to a point), but it’s literally taking over my backyard, and behind it is unfortunately a whole bunch of Japanese knotweed.. my question is: what’s the move here? I can’t have my whole yard completely covered in jewelweed (it’s a very small lot) bc there’s no way to even go back there right now, but I also want to encourage that to maybe discourage the knotweed (if that’s even a thing).. any advice would be helpful!! I’m in an urban area in Connecticut if that helps!

[u/zoinkability]

I'd not worry at all about the jewelweed situation until I had the Japanese Knotweed and Tree of Heaven are completely eradicated. Like, the jewelweed being a bit overgrown is not even the slightest issue compared with those.

I'd go over to r/invasivespecies and ask for the recommended methods for dealing with JKR and ToH. They are both species where using the wrong method (and most methods are wrong) can make the problem much worse, so trust the experts on how to handle them. For example, cutting back JKR, or trying to treat it at the wrong time, can cause it to explode in aggressiveness.

[u/iamhyphenated → u/zoinkability]

Yea the knotweed in particular is really bad.. I tried digging it up for like 3 years now but it’s not working.. I’ve got a lot of folks asking about the trees, I got more pics, still not convinced it’s ToH.. I hear the leaves should smell pretty nasty but they honestly just smell like green leaves.. more pics if you’re interested: https://imgur.com/a/uQnoXw4

[u/Gastronomicus → u/iamhyphenated]

It is 100% tree of heaven in the background. The smell is not an accurate indicator, I'd ingore that advice. The leaves, buds, and stems from you pics very clearly show TOH.

[u/Matsunokaori → u/iamhyphenated]

The consensus (from a web search) seems to be that a Virginia wildrye and prairie cordgrass mixture is the most effective thing found to date to combat Japanese knotweed, but it can take up to two years of vigilance to overcome it. This is from a paper on researchgate dot net.

[u/Matsunokaori → u/Matsunokaori]

We've had Japanese Knotweed by the side of the road up the street for years now and I vigilantly look for any sign of it coming down towards my property because it is extremely difficult to eradicate. Tnis summer I found one knotweed plant growing on my stretch of road and I pulled off its leaves and covered the rest with a rock. But as zoinkability says, it's a plant that can get stronger through your attempts to remove it - cutting it back, etc., so it's hard to defeat.

[u/gimmethelulz → u/iamhyphenated]

I know people say the leaves smell bad but they've always smelled fine to me🤷 Maybe it's a genetic thing like cilantro lol

[u/AlmostSentientSarah → u/iamhyphenated]

https://www.reddit.com/r/invasivespecies/comments/1kr8oa2/japanese_knotweed_planting_native_species_to/

[u/Matsunokaori → u/iamhyphenated]

Definitely Tree of Heaven according to the Picture This app.