These include couch (twitch), dandelion, dock, thistle, bindweed, horsetail, ground elder, and Japanese knotweed.

They live from year to year and can send up new shoots from their roots, so they survive hoeing to begin with.

• Hoeing off shoots cuts off new food supplies to the root.



• If hoeing is continued weekly, the pieces of root will eventually become exhausted and unable to produce any more shoots



• There's no need to pick up weeds after hoeing, unless they have flower heads (the flowers could still develop and produce seeds) or you want to do some work in the area.