Gardeners in the UK need to waste no time in taking action to avoid a popular plant from ruining their property. Cherished for its stunning purple blooms and captivating fragrance, Buddleia is a familiar presence in gardens throughout the UK.
Recognised as the butterfly bush, it’s beloved by pollinators thanks to its nectar-abundant flower clusters. Nevertheless, numerous gardening enthusiasts across Britain remain oblivious to the fact that this plant is extremely invasive and can inflict “severe damage” to properties. And time is running out to ensure it doesn’t have that impact on your home.
Experts say that, to avoid self-seeding, the plant should be dead-headed immediately after flowering. Gardeners should remove the flowers after they bloom in the late summer, before autumn fully arrives and the colder months are here.
Jennifer Holmes from Environment Controls admitted that buddleia is equally as “difficult to control or get rid of” as the infamous Japanese knotweed. A notoriously invasive species, Japanese knotweed is featured on Schedule 9 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act.
According to the legislation, permitting this plant to escape or causing it to flourish in the wild constitutes an offence. The aggressive plant spreads swiftly through an underground rhizome network, with its canes achieving a remarkable 7ft in height.
It can also penetrate fractures in paving and disrupt drainage pipes and other infrastructure like drainage pits, cables and water pipes. Similar to Japanese knotweed, buddleia is extremely invasive.
However, rather than spreading beneath ground, buddleia scatters through wind-carried seeds which can settle and sprout in building fractures and gaps. This favoured plant can achieve heights of 15ft and possesses a fibrous root network that can pierce the upper soil layer.
Buddleia, though not as notorious as Japanese knotweed, is causing a significant amount of damage across the UK, with property damages estimated at an astounding £1million. Jennifer clarified: “Both buddleia and knotweed can cause significant damage to building structures, however buddleia is less likely to damage underground infrastructure due to its shallow root system.
“Both are highly invasive and difficult to eradicate, but buddleia (unlike knotweed) can grow in hard to access areas such as roofs, guttering, window sills and walls basically anywhere that a seed lands it can grow. Knotweed on the other hand requires its roots to be on the ground in order to form plants.”
Legal experts have identified both as “problematic species” and conceded they’re “equally difficult to control or get rid of”. However, there’s light at the end of the tunnel for those grappling with these botanical brutes, as eradication is achievable through herbicides or excavation.
For those gardeners under siege from invasive plants, it is advised to enlist the help of experts who can permanently remove them.