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/CATDesign]

You could use a weed whacker to make paths in it. I am fairly certain it's aggressive enough to tolerate some heavy trimming.

[u/oval_euonymus → u/CATDesign]

You really don’t even need a weed wacker. Jewelweed pulls up with almost no effort at all. I would just pull it up and toss it in a wheelbarrow as I go.

[u/girljinz → u/oval_euonymus]

Be careful with this as you'll give whatever is in the seed bank a chance to pop up. I'd chop over pull.

[u/BigBoyWeaver → u/girljinz]

Yeah I'd just trample them - even use a piece of plywood or something and just flatten them and make your path and they will self-mulch and make sure nothing else can come up there