Andy lee explains the dangers of knot weed and how his Salford based business works to stop the spread.
Andrew Lee owns ‘WeedTec’ an award winning company based in Ellenbrook, Worsley, well known for fighting the spread of Japanese knot weed.
At the moment there are growing concerns that the cost of living crisis has affected peoples disposable income, therefore people are reluctant to spend money on extra expenses that they dont feel is a necessity, such as extracting knot weed.
Andys business works to highlight the importance of sorting out knot weed as soon as you find it, to avoid the consequences of it worsening in the future : “Japanese Knot weed if left untreated in the built environment will cause structural damage to footpaths, garden walls, driveways and also expose gaps in week concrete, or footing of properties.”
Japanese knot weed is an aggressive plant that will grow relentlessly if left alone. It was originally brought to the United Kingdom as an ornamental plant in 1825, before the dangers of the plant were understood. Knot weed is highly resilient to controls, Andy explained that: ” A Japanese Knot weed management plan normally consists of herbicide treatments in spring and autumn for a period of 3 years.” giving an clear insite into the strength of the plant.
Andys business has been tackling Knotweed problems in and around Salford for 20 years , he explained : “Some of our competitiors use scare tactics to push their services where as we prefer to guide our potential clients with a sensible approach of eradicating the problem.”
It has become clear that a lot of people are uneducated on knot weed and in consequence wouldn’t notice it even if it were there.
Salford University student Eden Latimer has potentially had a knot weed problem for a few years now and feels that if her family had known more about knot weed that they may have been able to find and do something about it earlier: “We have had knot weed supposedly for 5 years now but we never realized because we didn’t know what it looked like. Making the situation even worse because it has been growing for so long.”
Andy added to this by saying :” i would guess around 80% of clients we worked with weren’t aware they had Japanese Knot weed until they came to sell their property.”
As well as this, Eden suggested that their is confusion with land owners over who is responsible for sorting the problem: “The knot weed is not even in our land , but no one knows who is supposed to take control of the situation, nor do they want to pay, so over summer it has been growing.” Many people are unaware that it is illegal to know about the spreading of knot weed and not do anything about it, therefore as a landowner it is your duty of care to stop it spreading to your property.
Andy added that the consequences of allowing knot weed to spread to neighboring gardens : “can lead to litigation and people have also been issued with an anti-social behavior order (ASBO) for failing to implement a plan to tackle Japanese knot weed.”
The issues caused by Knot weed can have long lasting effects , recently banks and building society’s have refused mortgages on properties that have been affected by Japanese knot weed in a 30 meter radius. Andy further implied the importance of sorting it as soon as you find it by explaining : “We have never come across a home insurance company that would cover for Japanese Knot weed.”
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