Why the river valleys and the canal corridors around Stockport suit knotweed, and what to check along your own boundary.
Knotweed spreads from fragments of root, and rivers and canals are perfect for moving them. In Stockport the Goyt and the Tame meet to form the Mersey, and the Peak Forest and Macclesfield canals run through Marple and the south of the borough. Where a garden backs onto any of these, a stand can arrive without anyone seeing it.
Walk the bottom fence in spring for red-purple shoots, then again in July for tall hollow canes above the boundary. Pay attention to banks that flood, because floodwater can leave fragments behind.
Whoever owns the land it grows on. A survey of your own side shows whether it has crossed the line, and that record is what you hold if you need to raise it with someone.
