PowerSwitch

Invasive pest.
Neighbours want to know will a goat eat it without ill effect.
And what shelter or other welfare arrangements are needed to keep a goat short term in a large garden.
Would a garden shed, some straw for bedding, and fresh drinking water suffice ?

They do not intend to keep a goat permenently but are wondering about borrowing one if it will eat the weed without harm.

The recomended way of removing knotweed infestations is expensive and innvolves a lot of toxic materials. And does not allways work.

adam2 wrote:Invasive pest.
Neighbours want to know will a goat eat it without ill effect.

Should be fine. Humans can eat it, and it has been used as animal feed in the past (is drought resistant).

They do not intend to keep a goat permenently but are wondering about borrowing one if it will eat the weed without harm.

The recomended way of removing knotweed infestations is expensive and innvolves a lot of toxic materials. And does not allways work.

The goat might prefer to eat something else!

There is one potential problem, and that is that it contains salicylic acid, which can cause problems in sensitive individuals (humans or goats) who eat a lot of it.

But the main problem is that there is no way a goat can remove enough of the knotweed to clear the infestation. There really are only two ways to do that. One involves very toxic chemicals and the other involves digging a very large hole and dumping all the contents in a registered disposal site. Both are expensive. Knotweed is bad news.

The goat won't get rid of the roots, so it's not worth the hassle and welfare issues.

adam2 wrote:Invasive pest.

Knotweed or goat?

What about a pig. Pigs will turn the land over looking for roots if there is nothing else left to eat.

Edit to add:

Scratch that, I have just read the bugger sends down 9 foot deep root!

Apparently, if is fully edible. Hasn't someone figured out a way to harvest it and prepare as a foodstuff?

If a pig ate the surface vegetation and grubbed up the shallower roots, that would presumably EVENTUALY kill the knotweed ?
I would expect it to regrow from the deep roots, but not indefinatly since this deep roots would eventualy die without noursishment from the green part of the plant.

Biological control trials under way?

http://www.rhs.org.uk/Gardening/News/Ti ... nster-weed

If it is a small area, a combination cutting, glyphosate, covering with
pond liner and/or tarpauline or old carpet, dug in 1 foot at the edges, covering with mulch and leave for several years, looking for any runners emerging beyond the boundaries.

stevecook172001 wrote: Hasn't someone figured out a way to harvest it and prepare as a foodstuff?

Young shoots can be used as a direct replacement for rhubarb in recipes. It's very popular with my foraging students when they try it. It's a bind to collect and prepare though, because you can only use the softest bits.

There are also places that have knotweed eating contests. I think they eat the leaves, which can be used a bit like vine leaves.

RalphW wrote: covering with pond liner and/or tarpauline or old carpet...

Hah! Not with this plant. This plant has been known to appear in the living rooms of new houses having forced its way up not only through the carpet but through the concrete foundations of the house. That's why you have to pay to get it removed before building anything on a site where it is known to occur.

RalphW wrote:glyphosate,

No.

Are you on the Monsanto payroll?

No.

I was quoting a random web page after a google. Never a good idea...

I once spent a freezing January day trying and failing to suppress knotweed with a conservation group before it became a controlled weed.

Let us assume that Japan isn't overrun with the stuff. What have they got that controlls it, that we (another rain-soaked tea-swilling archipelego with Imperializt pretensions) are lacking?

RenewableCandy wrote:Let us assume that Japan isn't overrun with the stuff. What have they got that controlls it, that we (another rain-soaked tea-swilling archipelego with Imperializt pretensions) are lacking?

Aphalara itodori

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8555378.stm