I have a beautiful japanese anemone in the border..but it's spreading to a gravel/shingle area and sending up runners. If I spray the runners with glyphosate - will this travel along the underground roots and kill the mother plant. I obviously don't want to do this. I just want to kill the runners that pop up unwanted.

I am trying to grow this; by simply pulling up any runners I find in abandoned gardens.. they come up so easily; why use poison? If you were nearer I would gladly come and take these away for thee!

You are welcome to them Marigold

It's just in this particular area that they are being a nuisance. I've been pulling them up - but that's getting difficult as they are amongst gravel and big rockery stones. They are also coming up inside the nearby greenhouse - which is great as these are the ones I am pulling up and growing on. I suppose I'm just after the easy option, re the gravel part of the garden. I expect I shall have to take it all up and place a membrane down, and then put all the stones back I was just hoping for a simple control method.

I think I would create a slit trench with a spade between the flower area and the gravel and force some thick polythene down into it. The spreading roots are fairly shallow and you should cut through them this way. You'll have a double effect, the plastic will stop further escapes and if you weedkill the ones in the gravel it won't spread back to the main clump.

Hi Diane,
The method described by Geoff is very effective. With Japanese Anemones the rhizomes are quite shallow and if you were to sink a spade to its full depth and simply push to and fro so the slit remains open along the area where these rhizomes are a nuisance then carefully insert the Polythene it will work a treat for you. You can also limit the growth in other directions by simple making a slit trench around the plant and inserting a ring of polythene.
To give you an example of how well this method works. I have several Birch trees on my property and one in particular spread its roots right across my Strawberry bed and although I had to dig a trench 3ft deep and 28ft long and insert the heavy duty black Polythene it has worked a treat for at least 10 years now.
JB.

Thank you all for your assistance. Very much appreciated. I love this website - folk are so helpful.

I've been trying to remove some Japanese anemonies from part of my rockery by spraying them with weedkiller and they are very persistent. It hasn't killed them, but they are flowering at only 6inches tall just now and look quite pretty.