Also, I didn't address this, but I got this from Ashdown in 2009, so I it is an own root plant. At least that is my understanding. But I don't think there would be anyway for me to separate the roots of the diseased from the rest, because the most recent new growth is almost in the center, while the other section is on the far left. That would seem to me to indicate that too much of it is infected to even consider separating it. I'm not sure I have much confidence in it surviving anyway (especially with me doing a chopping job on it). I think I might be better off to bite the bullet, and proceed with another plan. I can't imagine the frustration of hacking down a row of productive blackcurrents 3 times. That had to be extremely painful. One thing this has done is motivate me to work on other areas of the lawn that I planned to take over anyway. My husband has been a bit resistant, but I have shown him enough nice examples of what can be done that he is now on board. I have about 13 boxwood, a cedar, and many other things that I need to plant now anyway. I've learned a great deal, and that is one of the things I love about gardening anyway-endless number of things to learn, and some aspects are just trial and error ultimately. You can't succeed if you don't try, and there are bound to be failures no matter what you do.

Really....RRV was never used as a control method nor was it introduced from anywhere. It has been around the U.S. since at least the 1940s. Was it likely spread by the use of multiflora as fences and such? Sure. But being mad about that would make as much sense as being mad 20 years from now if we discover that something we can't currently detect that is found on say Knock Outs, causes all other roses to die. Multiflora as a fence was a conservation idea and it works quite well if the person who uses it is willing to maintane it. Have there been things introduced that back fired? Sure. But the list of invasive and devasting ecosystem criters that have come here on their own is a far longer list: Japanese Beetles Fire Ants Raspberry Ants Africanized Bees Cactus Moths Asian Citrus Psylid Mistle toe Water Hyacinth Snake Heads Armored Catfish Formosen Termites etc etc etc. Do Chemicals have a place? Yes. Should they be used exclusively or all the time-probably not but that is your decision. The above linked article was an uninformed paper from 2000 and I haven't been able to find any evidence that people ever used RRV as a control method. He was writing as it showed promise as a possible control method. In case you don't realize how this works currently, they test it extensively in controlled situations prior to using it as a commercial control. They have been testing a parasitic wasp to control fire ants for over a decade and still haven't released them.

I'm glad to read all these reports; they're interesting! Thanks to everyone who's written in. Rosemeadowgardener: I don't recognize any of the weeds you list; are they Australian natives, or exotic: do you know their botanical names? Thank God we don't have one of the worst curses of North America here: no poison ivy, oak, sumac. How interesting to read Marianne's weed list from the other end of the European temperate zone and discover that I have all the nasty weeds she does, and several of the nice ones. Galium aperine is an unpleasant plant, sticky and climbing, but there are a number of other Galium species that grow locally that are rather nice. Sweet woodruff is Galium odoratum. Our native primrose is Primula vulgaris; and we too have anemones, hepaticas, wild geraniums--harebells I think not. Connie speaks of the huge weed population of her property, which is an old farm. We too garden on a former farm and downhill from a current one, and I agree with what her post suggests, that agricultural properties present particular weed problems. Ongoing plowing leaves ground permanently disturbed, given weeds fertile ground to grow; grazing animals can trample ground, and the hay brought in to feed them can bring weed seeds from other areas. The year after the shade garden was flooded with manure from a cattle enclosure above, the weed population there was amazing. And we get great numbers of weeds, some of them highly obnoxious, along the drainage ditches that descend from our neighbors' plowed fields through our own land. Then, if fields and pastures are abandoned, they begin to go to brush, and you get brambles and other colonizing species--Connie's plant list is different from mine, but the process is the same. What the heck is Creeping Charlie? A couple of you have mentioned it. The various posts have covered quite a bit of territory, not only in the literal sense, on the topic of weeds. Paula took up the issue of invasive exotics that push out native species on undomesticated land (as well as the native but obnoxious Poison Oak). This is a problem all over the world, of course. I read in that interesting book 'Ecological Imperialism' about how many plants flourished in Europe along with the development of agriculture and became weeds, then traveled all over the world with European colonizers and established themselves in temperate zones everywhere, often at considerable cost to native species. We too have our exotic invasive species--one standout here in the hills is black locust, Robinia pseudoacacia, originally from North America--but I wonder what the effect has been on our native flora of a few thousand years of tolerably intensive agriculture. Were there species that went extinct because they were useless to humans and occupied land that could be used for farming and other useful activities? Some plant populations exist in part as a result of human activities: we have a rich population of native orchids many of which grow in pasture land and are now threatened because grazing is disappearing and the land is turning to brushland and then to woods. But perhaps three thousand years ago the orchids that grew were those adapted to woodlands? Lavender lass: do you know the species name of your artemisia? We have one ugly native artemisia, A. vulgaris, but a couple of nice ones. Another pleasant weed I remembered is lemon balm, Melissa officinalis--what a fine plant to share a name with. It's too invasive to plant, but grows wild at the edges of beds, is fragrant, and has fresh green leaves that are pretty in spring. I feel better every time I see it. I like mulleins too. We have a woolly species similar to what erasmus describes which makes a fine ornamental; the problem is that it seems to need a somewhat lighter soil than is present in most of our garden; otherwise it's not fussy. Melissa

What I did was to cut off the diseased growth below the point on the cane that it appeared on. Any new growth from that cane has not shown any more symptoms with the exception of General Cavaignac. It was asymptomatic for a whole year but started showing it again. I cut it off and watered it with more aspirin, and it has been okay. I am suspecting a reinfection rather than a relapse because it is close to the infected Dr. Huey. I have used an aspirin spray. I have used one 325 mg pill per 3 gallons of water, the size of my tank sprayer. I do have to watch it carefully because I have seen foliage burn on some of the plants doing this. There is increased blackspot resistance from this treatment, but again foliage burn can be a risk. I have also been using the harpin material for good blackspot control, but it does not appear to have much influence, if any, over rosette. I think that early detection and treatment is a key help for this problem, like cancer. If it gets too far along, the plant will probably be lost. I am also wondering if an interferon-like material would be a good treatment option if it could be either sprayed or maybe watered into the ground. I hope these observations help this situation somehow.