Cwm Cottage January 25, 2007

We moved into Cwm Cottage in autumn 2005, having decided to rent it without even having been inside the house! The garden was just exactly what we wanted – a challenge! Fortunately the house was lovely, if a little neglected - it had been empty for about a year, and had clearly not been loved for alot longer. The garden was a jungle of knotweed (eek) and other 6ft high weeds, and Steve spent many evenings with a machete hacking through the undergrowth before we were even able to see the full extent of the garden.

 Gradually we have tamed the wilderness, although the knotweed is still a big problem, and harsh tactics are having to be resorted to. We started by trying to break its spirit – snapping it off at ground level every time it sprouted up, but alas this proved to be a pointless waste of time that just exacerbated the problem. For every one stem we snapped off, 10 would sprout in its place! It really wants to grow, this stuff….. So, having borrowed some evil chemicals, a safety suit, goggles and thick gloves from our neighbour Mark (who has an abundance of the weed in his field), Steve set about spraying where it wouldn’t cause damage to other plants, and painting leaves where it would. It seemed to die, but, knowing how tenacious this stuff is, we will be keeping a very close eye on it in the spring, and zapping any shoots that dare to sprout! In everything else we do in the garden, we try to be as organic as possible, particularly with the veg. But with the knotweed we reluctantly realised that we would have to resort to chemicals.