Please help me identify this plant

leck

This plant has become very widespread across a few beds. Looks like something that might work as a groundcover in a shady area, but very agressive where it is now.

prinzeugen

leck wrote: »

This plant has become very widespread across a few beds. Looks like something that might work as a groundcover in a shady area, but very agressive where it is now.

No pic?

mountainy man

Chameleon plant or Houttuynia cordata.

This plant is the work of satan, terribly invasive, I hate it, be afraid!

leck

I'm back to thinking what to do about this plant. Indeed, it seems to be widely-regarded as the work of Satan. When googling it, I came across this forum where people have said it can take up to five years to eradicate it. http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1699407/help-chameleon-plants-gone-wild

I have it mainly in one long bed under the kitchen window (bits popping up in other beds too, but not so bad there). From what I read, it would seem that the only thing that will work is to completely empty the bed and start over. If I dig it out (or had it dug out!) would I need to discard all the soil, or would sifting it work to get rid of roots - that would be extremely labour intensive. I presume the plant mostly spread vegetatively, or would seeds in the soil be a problem too?

The bed is 5m long and 0.5m wide. Other than the Chameleon plant, the bed has two Euonymus shrubs and a couple of Hostas, also a clump of grass that is another plant from hell. I might put the Hostas in two pots and hope there are no traces of the satanic plant on their roots. Will probably discard the Euonymus.