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May 18, 2006
WEEDS!
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What's blooming in May along with a brilliant tulip display, the early perennials and the first annuals, is a healthy crop of Weeds. Two particularly ubiquitous varieties are all over our park woodlands, Garlic Mustard and Celandine Poppies. Although if you are pulling them up they are both thugs, one, the Garlic Mustard, is an invasive species, and univerally condemned as a threat to our environment, the other, the Celandine Poppy, is a native woodland plant that "self sows and naturalizes readily". The old saw that a weed is just a plant you don't want is proved once again.
Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata) is a European import. It is a biennial, rosettes of heart shaped leaves appear to be followed in year two by the small white flower atop a tall (2 to 3-1/2ft.) stem. We have never found it particularly fussy, but its preferred habitat is moist, shaded soil and disturbed areas. Blooming in May and June, it can rapidly take over a woodland or field, out-competing both natives and introduced species. The seed, which is copious, can remain viable for up to 5 years, so the goal should be to remove the plant before it sets seed. Annoyingly deer, which can be relied upon to eat any number of desirable species, are not fond of Garlic Mustard. Luckily it does pull up quite easily especially when it is young.
The Celandine Poppy (Stylophorum diphyllum) is a very different case. It has an attractive yellow flower and lobbed blue green foliage. Garden in the Woods, the magnificent woodland created by the New England Wildflower Society in Framingham MA, sells it in its nursery- with no disclaimer or warning. It spreads very easily and looks sad and weedy the minute it stops blooming, not to mention the fact that it has a knack for infesting many areas where its color or habit is wrong- wrong- wrong. Remember, when you are struggling to pull it out of your garden or woodland, and the fat, brittle, orange root has broken off in your hands and stained them deep orange, that this is not a weed, it is a precious native wild flower.
Posted by gardenguidenyc at May 18, 2006 12:33 PM