Weeds - Ground Elder

Ground elder has a leaf and flower similar to an elder tree, although they are not related. It grows from long, white roots, which intertwine each other. You need to remove those roots rather than just the plant above the ground, or it will continue growing. The roots spread fast, and this is one of the bad weeds in our garden!

The roots are fairly close to the surface, and it should be possible to remove them entirely, but it seems to be very hard! Start with a plant above ground (which doesn't grow in the winter, but starts again in spring). Find the root, and follow it along, possibly using a trowel. Try to avoid it breaking because then you might lose it. It may go under other roots of ground elder. With a tangle of ground elder roots, you need to follow every root to its end. The roots may also go under paths, or the neighbour's fence, so you will have to abandon it. It is very satisfying when you can manage to get to the end and remove the entire root. This could be quite long, and other ground elder plants grow along it. Sometimes the root goes under a normal garden plant, and then you have a problem. You may be able to pull it through, but the roots may entangle each other. In a really bad case, you can dig up the other plant, turn it over, and pull out all the ground elder roots you see (which are distinctive, being white), then replant the original plant. The problem is that most plants don't like this! Make sure you water them when you replant them, plus afterwards until they re-establish. Even so, I've lost plants when I've done this.

Sometimes the ground elder has a central plant, with more normal roots, and it's well worth finding and removing that, as it seems to put out a lot more long snakey roots than the others. We call it the "mother ship!"

If you don't remove ground elder, it spreads, and smothers other plants, until that part of the garden becomes mostly ground elder. If it gets round to flowering, then you haven't been controlling it well enough. (Hm!)

First leaf coming through

Which turns into this

Ground elder roots

Flower

Growing up a fence

Click on photos for large version.