I offered mine on Freecycle, free to anyone who would come and dig it up. I got lots of replies and it was gone in a couple of days, and I didn't have to do the digging. I'm planning to get rid of about 40 square feet of feet of black mondo grass the same way.

I don't have that option as it is in my hostas and spirea bushes now.

leafy- can I PUHLEEEEESE have your black mondo grass? it is so true that, as paul simon says,One Man's Ceiling is Another Man's Floor. But seriously, that stuff is so tough you could just throw it in a box and send it to me and it would probably survive. Gosh I would happily send you something you'd like, to make it worth your trouble. Any requests? I'd be happy to oblige. You can see alot of our arboretum plants on our new website.

www.cottonarboretum.com/

best,
mindy
cottonarboretum@comcast.net

liriope is really easy for me to remove because of its neat clumps of sturdy shallow roots. you have had no luck removing it by hand? if it's as close to your hosta and spirea roots as you seem to indicate, i would not recommend Roundup like things because roundup will kill any plants that it gets on. I would use one of those narrow forked(central- notched) weeding tools good for dandelion type roots.

best,
mindy

I find Liriope muscari pretty easy to keep under control - L. muscari is a clumper, not a runner, so I just take a shovel and hack off the daughter clumps, and a good pull takes care of it and the roots.

Sorry, arbo retum. I can't dig right now due to a rotator cuff injury, so the Freecyclers who will dig their own are gonna get the mondo.

I don't know what variety it is...just green not varigated with pale blue spires in fall...followed by black berries. It forms a dense mat that cannot be pulled up. Even when it gets loose as a single plant it is almost impossible to dig out. Tough stuff. The only good place to put it is between two concrete paths or between a house and a sideway. Must be contained!

Relatively speaking, Liriope is somewhat RoundUp resistant.

I use either a sharp shovel or a long sharp knife to cut through the very dense root mat, then pry it up. I found that repurposing an old carving knife was well worth it overall if you have one.

It helps to water the area well a couple of days prior to loosen up the soil for the prying it up part.

I'm afraid thinning out monkey grass is just always going to be hard work.