A short time ago, in a garden not that far away…

Episode I: Uprooting

Yes, I am the perfect age to have seen the Star Wars movies as a little kid and for that to have a huge impact. The original three are better. 

Plant-wise though, this is about weeds and invasive plant species, which are two different things. A weed is basically a plant that is growing somewhere that you don’t want it to grow, and it can be anything from native stinging nettle and poison ivy to the random carrot that managed to sprout from a seed left over winter. An invasive plant, however, is a non-native plant that was brought (here) by humans one way or another, and grows in a such a way as to force out native plants and disrupt the established local ecosystem.

One of the best ways to deal with both weeds and most invasive plants is the same - uproot them. How easy this is really depends on the plant, because some have scraggly shallow little root systems, some have shallow but lo-o-o-n-g skinny spreading root systems, some have big thick taproots, some have crooked taproots… And they all need to be carefully pulled up in their entirety if you really truly want to be rid of them. After they’re up, in whole or in part, you generally can’t just leave them sitting on the soil where you put them after pulling, because they have an incredible tendency to re-root. Quickly. Very frustrating, it is, to do a lot of weeding then find out in a few days that you have to pull up the exact same plants again. So, uproot as much of the root as possible! Then put them somewhere to die. I admit to feeling a definite sense of satisfaction when I look at a pile or bag of dried up, shrunken, shrivelled plants that were once where I DID NOT want them to be!

Warring on weeds and invasive plants is one of those long, many-year endeavours that can sometimes seem futile but truly isn’t. It really does help the plants you want in your garden when you weed, even if you do need to keep doing it over and over. It really does help to get rid of the perimeter of your invasive plant front, even if you look at the centre of the infestation and it looks huge. Eventually, good will prevail! Defeated the Dark Side (er, Weedy? Side) will be!