purpleinopp said: I think I have lost this battle with Callisia repens.

It is a pretty ground cover. Just act like you meant to put it there.

It does a pretty good none of completely covering the soil.

Agreed. I have shifted my game plan for that area to using just tall stuff that can get above it. Life's too short to spend more of it trying to get rid of a plant that I do like but just didn't want it growing over top of the fru-fru cuttings, mostly Coleus, that I've usually used that area for.

blue23rose said: Ooooh! Violets are the worst! I bet I spend 20 hours each year trying to keep them under control, but leaving the tiniest bit behind defeats my purpose.

All of these pictures are from 2010 and I am still trying to eradicate them
Spiderwort - loved it when we had our oak tree


Anemone Sylvestris (Snowdrop Anemone)

• Snowdrop Anemone (Anemone sylvestris)
• Uploaded by blue23rose

• Snowdrop Anemone (Anemone sylvestris)
• Uploaded by blue23rose

Japanese Anemone (Eriocapitella hybrida 'Prinz Heinrich'). I do like this one, but it needs space, and lots of it!

• Japanese Anemone (Eriocapitella hybrida 'Prinz Heinrich')
• Uploaded by blue23rose

I give!! Took this picture last week. Over 12 years later after my initial planting of Japanese Anemone (Eriocapitella hybrida 'Prinz Heinrich'), it is still working its way up through my variegated liriope, so this year, I let it go. Probably a big mistake.

Adding to the list: lobelia chin ensis. Almost as bad to remove as chameleon flower!
And, liriope is still coming up 😒😵🙄

For me, I am having a battle with Ivy taking over fences and beds. The ivy was pretty when it was behaving itself.
Today will be arriving some weed and grass killer and a big pump-action spray bottle.
Not sure if the ivy belongs to us or a neighbor. Either way, it is getting blasted if it is on my fence and in my garden beds. There is just too much of it to deal with by trying to cut it away.
No idea if the weed/grass killer will do anything, but at least I will feel like I am taking some kind of action.

Mexican petunias, they spread like crazy an round-up won't even kill'um. it'll kill'um back but they sprout right back up. And i even doubled up on the strenght of the spray.....

Also, anyone got experience with spanish bluebells/pinkbells/whitebells (also known as wood hyacinths)?
I got a bag of bulbs as a mistake from a vendor, and have read good (pretty) and bad (invasive) things about them. Does anyone have personal experience? The advert photos are enticing. But I am very wary.

Ivy on a fence shouldn't need to be sprayed, just sever where it coming up from the ground. It will still be stuck to the fence and need to be manually removed, whether dead or alive, so spraying doesn't provide a shortcut for climbing growth. Once you pull it off of the fence, a string trimmer should be enough to prevent it from going up the fence again. 'Cides have labels that describe when and how they can work, and what plants they can and can't kill. If it didn't matter which one, there wouldn't be so many different ones. If the conditions are not right and it doesn't work, or if it is not known to be effective on ivy, it wouldn't make sense to put that stuff out into the world without any benefit. I can understand and support not wanting the ivy but when chem warfare is done, I believe it should be precise and done at a time and in a way that should reasonably result in success, not just haphazardly taking a stab at it to see if it works. And that stuff is probably expensive. Don't waste your $ if it's not going to kill ivy. Ivy is such a studied plant, I'm sure reliable info on proven methods, products, & timing is available.

The ivy on your side belongs to you, on the other side, it belongs to the neighbors. If both want it gone, a combined approach would probably be the most effective. Or at least a plan to prevent re-infestation on your side.

I've battled ivy before, don't envy your chore! I was glad I had help. It would be very daunting to face alone if has been establishing for a few years.

Thank-you for sharing your beliefs. I do not share them.
But I needed this stuff anyway. I used to buy it in little hand-held spray bottles for destroying weeds on walls and under fences, and in cracks on the driveway. I just got a bigger concentrated batch is all, to save money. I cannot sever the ivy at the ground without climbing over the fence. I am on a hill and it grows from down below, in a ditch a few feet drop below the base of my fence and yard, outside my property line (I think - the ditch is in a "no-mans-land" between properties). Trimming it at the fence line will not kill it, just give it a haircut, as I have been doing. And am tired of doing. I think it is eroding the wooden beams along the base of my fence (the fence itself is metal chainlink), meaning my yard will soon crumble down into this ditch, taking the fence with it.

For some reason this year it decided it wanted to rapidly invade from all sides at the same time. It is choking everything. Trees, shrubs, perennials, even the lawn.

plasko20 said: Also, anyone got experience with spanish bluebells/pinkbells/whitebells (also known as wood hyacinths)?
I got a bag of bulbs as a mistake from a vendor, and have read good (pretty) and bad (invasive) things about them. Does anyone have personal experience? The advert photos are enticing. But I am very wary.

They will form colonies and may wander off; so I would recommend not naturalizing them, and deadheading

I planted a beautiful variegated japanese honeysuckle vine 30 years ago. Well the variegation is long gone but of course the vicious vine remains.

Currently I'm battling Elephantopus carolinianus. It's a native I picked up at a native plants booth at a fair a couple years ago. It has tiny but pretty flowers. Since it's native, I guess I can't call it invasive, but it has been a terrible pest. It spreads rampantly and has remarkably deep roots making it very difficult to remove. I have to use a tined mattock to pry each plant from the ground.





Another plant I regret planting is Orixa japonica. It is a shrub about the size of a shrub honeysuckle. It has pretty glossy green foliage but flowers are forgettable. It has spread relentlessly through my wooded property. I've had to repeatedly raze the shrubs to the ground with a chainsaw, then continuously remove the regrowth. I think I'm making headway, but it's been a major chore.

Some of the older honeysuckles really do have a bad name, Scott.
I got a newer non-invasive cultivar that I love, and that is blooming even today at the end of October. Bees love it, as do hummingbirds. It is called "Goldflame", I think. I keep it small and tidy. But other beauties are out there like "pink cloud", "peaches and cream", etc etc.

Still, I really like variegated plants. I probably would have snapped yours up were it on sale today

This weekend I was still picking out surviving pieces of the porcelain vine I thought I killed a while back. That thing is a Halloween ghost come back to haunt me.

And I of course can't keep porcelain vine alive ...

Porcelain vine loves to engulf everything and take over whole forests here in VA

Porcelain vine is invasive here, too. I'm still battling the ivy, but I've found I can yank it up out of the ground without too much pulling. I still haven't cleared the dead off the side of the house, bad gardener me! For the poison ivy, poison oak and blackberries that carpet the back yard I sprayed twice, and now I mow the back yard at a scalper level and they haven't come back.
I have no issues using herbicides if needed, but lately I've chosen not to use them, just lazy or not really caring about the weeds. I will put something on the front yard to get rid of the stickers because we go out there barefoot, it really needs to go, and it's spreading. Maybe a pre emergent this spring.

Scott, I just picked up Elephantopus carolinianus at a native plant sale. I was going to plant it in a wild situation at a local park where there is a native plant program going on. That fact that it is aggressive would be OK since it has to fight against things like mugwort but now I am wondering if I should just chuck it.

Loretta, in a wild situation, it might be fine. I just would caution against putting it in any place you wanted to maintain some degree of control. It has crept into my lawn (not that I care about my lawn, which is mainly weeds anyway), but it doesn't bother me there because the lawn mower keeps it from flowering and setting more seed.

Are the Japanese anemones really invasive and hard to be rid of? I have been considering planting some because they are pretty and I believe they will bloom into the fall but would like people's opinions as to whether they are nuisance. Are they spread by seed being dispersed anywhere and everywhere like foxloves or are they spreading via roots?

I think it also differs from variety; but not sure how it spreads though.