Japanese honeysuckle is an invasive alien, that most small yards just have no room for. I love driving down the highways and county roads and smelling it. It even grows along side our long driveway where it is kept in check by the dense shade of the woods. It can be very difficult to dig out, but that is what must be done if you have plants in among it that you want to save. Good luck with it.

Melanie, Well, at least now you know what the problem is.

I love coral honeysuckle and have several of them planted in various locations, but never would plant Japanese honeysuckle. We have it in one part of our woodland (luckily, very far from the house) and I am hoping the last two years of drought might have killed it. I need to put on some boots and venture deeply into the shady and snakey woods to go see if maybe it died. I worry about the Japanese honeysuckle spreading, but it is about 250 or 300 yards from the house, so maybe it never will make its way up here.

Start digging and reclaim your landscape! You'll be so much happier after you get rid of that honeysuckle, which Dorothy and I both are assuming is Japanese honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica) merely because it is the very invasive one. If you like the scent and want to have it around, any of the coral honeysuckle (Lonicare sempervirens) varieties give you the scent without the invasiveness. Mine has stayed in the place where I planted it over a decade ago and never has tried to go wild and grow all over like the Japanese honeysuckle does.

Dawn