Mind-your-own-business is a creeping evergreen

Perennials are plants that live for multiple years. They come in all shapes and sizes and fill our gardens with colourful flowers and ornamental foliage. Many are hardy and can survive outdoors all year round, while less hardy types need protection over winter. The term herbaceous perennial is used to describe long-lived plants without a permanent woody structure (they die back to ground level each autumn), distinguishing them from trees, shrubs and sub-shrubs.

Gardeners often use the word variety when referring to a specific plant, but the correct botanical term is 'cultivar'. Whichever word you use, it means a distinctive plant or plants, given a specific cultivar name and usually bred to enhance certain characteristics, such as flower or fruit size, colour, flavour or fragrance, plant size, hardiness, disease resistance, etc. Additionally, it is worth knowing that, botanically, variety has another meaning - it refers to a naturally-occurring distinct plant that only has slight differences in its looks. For example, Malva alcea var. fastigiata differs from typical plants by having an upright habit.

cultivar

Mind-your-own-business is well-known for its ability to creep and spread, even in difficult growing conditions, and gardeners use this to their advantage when planting it to fill gaps in paving and drystone walls. It can be used as a lawn substitute in damp shade, used to create green walls and can even be used to create living sculptures, growing over chicken wire packed with growing media.

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Mind-your-own-business adds interest and colour to a stone wall 

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Its compact growth and foliage colours make it a good choice for green walls 

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Mind-your-own-business trails over baskets or pots 

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It can be kept indoors and grown as a houseplant 

Here are our answers to your most common questions about dealing with mind-your-own-business: 

How invasive is mind-your-own-business?

Mind-your-own-business spreads quickly and easily by its creeping, rooting stems. Keeping a single clump in check is not too difficult with regular maintenance, but as its stems can easily be detached and moved around the garden, and tiny stem sections overlooked when weeding, a single plant can quickly become several. It can be especially troublesome in lawns, as mowing chops up and distributes the stems. 

Do I need to get rid of mind-your-own-business? 

No – allowing mind-your-own-business to fill gaps in paving and walls, grow as ground cover in mature, shady beds, or grow among grasses in a species-rich lawn is a great way to boost the biodiversity of your garden.

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Mind-your-own-business creates ground conditions that favour invertebrates, such as these springtails

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Violet ground beetles enjoy the conditions created by low ground cover plants like mind-your-own-business

What is the easiest way to kill mind-your-own-business?

If you have mind-your-own-business growing where it is not wanted, there are a few ways to remove it: 

In beds and borders 

• Remove plants with a trowel or hand fork – mind-your-own-business isn’t deep-rooting so is easily prized from the soil. Be thorough, removing as many pieces of stem as you can.  
• Avoid digging and hoeing – as this can chop up and spread the rooting stems. Instead, where mind-your-own-business is dense and widespread, use a sharp spade to skim-off and remove the topmost layer of soil, minimising soil disturbance to lower layers.   
• Supress weed growth – cover soil cleared of mind-your-own-business with an 8cm (3in) thick layer of organic matter to block out light and smother any regrowth. Alternatively, fill gaps in beds with mat-forming ground cover plants. 

In lawns 

• Remove plants and repair patches – use a trowel or hand fork to prize individual plants or small clumps from the soil and repair any resulting bare patches. This is best done in April or September to coincide with the best times to sow grass seed and lay turf.  
• Lightly scarify – use a spring-tined rake to remove the bulk of mind-your-own-business stems in autumn, encouraging denser grass growth. 
• Rake before you mow – this raises stems up for the mower blades. Just be sure to rake up and remove lawn clippings afterwards so stem sections don’t re-root. 
• Encourage a healthy lawn – follow a lawn maintenance regime in spring/summer and autumn to encourage dense, healthy grass growth that will outcompete mind-your-own-business.

Should I use weedkiller? 

No – as mind-your-own-business can be controlled using non-chemical methods, there is no need to use a weedkiller. Mind-your-own-business is resistant to selective weedkillers for lawns, so although control here can be tricky, non-chemical methods are still your best option.

For more information, see our page on Weeds: non-chemical controls.