Hi all,

Anyone have any ideas on this mystery weed (or maybe not a weed?) that has been finding a nice home in my neighbor's side yard? It's driving me nutso, wrecking havoc on my fence line and doesn't seem to want to die. I've nicely asked my neighbor to cut it back off the fence a few times because it's pushing and ruining boards but it just keeps getting kind of ignored... I don't think they feel the weeds or the fence is a big enough issue to do anything about, basically. That's a whole other story. *sigh*

Anyway, I really took a good look at it today and it's a little forest they've got going over there and almost taller than the 6ft fence! It seems to go away in winter leaving brittle/almost straw-colored stalks behind and then in spring it goes crazy. I thought it was some kind of bamboo (it's stalky and has some bands and when it bends it seems hollow and it's really hard to tear off) but I don't think bamboo has leave like this? It's got some red and purple-ish stems (some are also green and some of the stalks are bigger than I could get a photo of because I was trying be semi-stealthy from my side looking down). The leaves are quite pretty but I am kind of stumped, especially because it is almost entirely impossible to keep it from popping over on my side of the fence and the stalks at the bottom are getting strong enough to actually push boards out like I mentioned earlier. I've been thinking more seriously about selling lately and I have a French drain on that side of my home as well as a really nice pond/fountain that was about $3k. So, it occurred to me today when I saw that forest that this thing might be something really invasive and I had better figure it out. The whole fence line on that side is actually also being slowly destroyed by their trees that were planted too close which is something else that I need to address :-(, but I guess first things first, and my foundation/house would definitely trump the fence. :-0

So, guesses? Advice on how to keep it from visiting my side? Thank you in advance for any information!