I have a giant pokeweed that spent the summmer peering into my dinigroom window, some days i swear it grew at least 6 inches! My husband was supposed to tear it out, but its still here. I know im going to have a monster to deal with next year!
I kinda like queen annes lace, it isnt in my yard but it grows roadside. I think its pretty!

I vote for creeping charlie. It is mostly a lawn weed, but it still shows up in the garden beds too.

I've got some garlic mustard which is beginning to be an increasing problem - didn't really notice it till about two years ago and can see the increase of it in the yard.

My main nemesis is something I think is sheep's sorrel. That's the closest I can come to identifying it. Man, do I hate that stuff. Low-growing, small leaves, and when you pull it up, the roots are two miles long - and usually attached to another plant, which is kinda good, since you pull up two weeds for the price of one, lol.

I just can't seem to get rid of it. It is just everywhere. It really does drive me nuts.

:)
Dee

The worst offenders in my yard are violets, creeping charlie, and grass. The violets make me want to cry.

Oh, if we're going to start talking about "real" weeds, Purslane is horrendous for me. ;)

Another, sort of odd weed in my garden, is the hundreds/thousands of Norway Maple seedlings each year from my neighbours yard. Any suggestions?

Wild Violets
Dichondra (Carolina ponysfoot)
and two old standby's
Chickweed
Dandelions

Two invasives that I planted (vision me kicking myself all around the garden)!
Iris japonica -- they emerge from lo-o-o-ng stolons many feet from the Mother plant and they are evergreen! So they are a year around problem.

Disporum sessile 'Variegata' They were planted near a huge clump of Arum italicum and so far, the results are: Disporum = 1, Arum = 0

Buttercup and Herb Robert.

Another wow -- Disporum sessile 'Variegata'!?! Back in the day, people paid a lot of money for that plant. I would expect they still do, in certain circles. ;)

Yellow wood sorrel. It accounts for 95 % of all my weeding. You can't really pull it up: it usually breaks off below the soil and reprouts. I just try to keep it from seeding.

Linnea, I googled the yellow wood sorrel, and ah yes, I am all too familiar with that plant. Now I have a name for it. I still would consider it less aggravating than the sheep's sorrel in my garden, though.

I too try to keep it from reseeding. It's kind of deceptive in that it looks like a rather fragile plant, easy to pull, and then it tricks you by breaking off at the soil level, to live and grow another day!

:)
Dee

OMG .. the sheep sorrel ... bingo ...

i hate with the white hot passion of the burning sun ....

i though it was called devils tongue or something devil'ish ...

ken

Ever since my neighbor left a stand of garlic mustard because she thought it was pretty, I've been fighting that (on her side of the fence I think the dogs finally trampled it). My revenge is that I eat it.

In the last couple of years I've been plagued with Queen Anne's Lace and a very tall aster.

There's plenty of ground ivy, crabgrass, spiderwort, motherwort, ditch lilies, Virginia Creeper, neighbor's encroaching ivies and creeping euonymus, Those are all a fight, but I don't always feel like I'm losing badly.

Well, weeds do come and go and change over the years, actually. Depending upon the stage the land is in -- different weeds on freshy tilled, disturbed soil than in old, established beds or in the "wooded" area at the back of my yard.

But, the things that have been most troubling the past few seasons are:

Sow thistles -- became established in my iris, peonies, and strawberries. You pull one, and six pop up from the remnant roots to replace it.

Garlic Mustard. I actually planted it about 10-12 years ago, as a new "crop" for its edible qualities. Its still edible, of course, but who needs 2000 of them? Sorry I did this.

Pokeweed -- same story. I have a bed of them, having discovered last year that the spring greens taste like asparagus and have the texture of spinach. However, I have also discovered that they have the ability to self-sow with abandon, probably helped along by the birds. So, this year, I made a real effort to gather and discard all of the berry clusters before they got to the point of being disbursed.

Yellow wood sorrel - and garlic mustard since an elderly neighbour has stopped maintaining under some trees and let it flower/spread...

Sheep sorrel I don't have here but I remember it from childhood. Mostly I remember how much I liked the taste of it! Have you tried eating it? Add it to salads for an interesting tart accent...

Isn't "weed" a subjective term? I don't consider clover a weed - it's green, it has pretty flowers, the bees love it and from a distance it looks like grass, so who cares if it's taken over the backyard lawn? Hey, when I was a kid and my sub was surrounded by fields, my old-country Italian neighbor used to walk home with a bushel-basket of dandelions, no doubt she enjoyed the dandelion wine :0).

Nutsedge, hands down, is the orneriest one I deal with. It adores wet soil, read poor drainage. It's perennial. It puts down thread fine roots about a foot deep, forms a bulbil and then puts out roots from there going in every direction. There's no pulling: the roots break and the bulb stays. There's no digging: the roots break and the bulbil is the color of soil. It also seeds rampantly...the bain of my existence. I once had it literally take over a bed. When I asked for help from the Extension Service, they said to relocate the bed...

Yellow wood sorrel: free plants with every garden center purchase: need I say more? I'd curse the nurseries, but I can't seem to control it either.

Then there's dollar weed....I'm pretty sure this one is a southern one, lucky y'all. We don't have garlic mustard (yet), so I guess there's some justice in the world.

"...i hate with the white hot passion of the burning sun ...."

LOL, Ken, I do believe this is the most worked up I've ever seen you on these forums!! But trust me, since we are talking sheep's sorrel, I completely understand!

Maybe I shall have to take revenge and start eating it in my salads...

Dirtdiver, you mentioned Virginia Creeper. I have a lot of this, but for the most part it stays in my woods, and I have to say it is gorgeous in the fall.

A friend of mine actually planted some in a small, enclosed front bed, right under the window of her house. She wound it under the front step of the porch, and let it grow up and over the garage doors. It was really quite spectacular. She kept it well-trimmed and never had a problem with it, most likely because that bed was surrounded by the house, the porch, the driveway, and a brick wall.

I've thought of doing the same over my garage doors, keeping it planted in a pot at the base of the garage, but I'm afraid, very afraid....

:)
Dee

I think Virginia Creeper is actually a decent plant. But in smaller, more urban spaces it can be a little hard to deal with. My first encounter with it was at my old house on a narrow, shady city lot, where a neighbor planted it along a chainlink fence. It did a great and quick job of covering the fence. It also managed to sneak across my brick patio while I wasn't looking and went so far as to crawl into the house through the bottom of a sidelight door panel. I have to work a bit at this house to keep it in line, because it wants desperately to climb up my delicate stucco and dance all over the yews. If I had woods I'd just let it do what it wants. And I agree: It does look lovely in the fall.

yes mx... a weed ... by my definition .. is simply something you do NOT want in your garden ...

in my sand.. on 5 acres ... mostly full hot sun ... the lawn goes dormant in late june thru sept ... the ONLY thing that stays green in the meadow [since i refuse to call it a lawn] ... is danylions.. plantain.. clover ... etc] .... they are MY MEADOW ... and the reason the local rabbits graze my meadow.. rather than my garden ... go figure.. they like the salad bar rather than a monoculture meal ... meaning they dont go after my hosta ....

most weeds are very cooperative in staying in the meadow ....

but some.. like clover.. have a tendency to invade the beds .... and clover.. once it gets a grip in there.. can be hard to remove .... talk about some rooting power ... and spreading.. OMG.. what a weed ...

so yeah.. its all subjective ...

did we all start with one curiosity of a pokeweed.. we let grow one summer... and now.. decades later.. we are still trying to get rid of them .. yikes... i dug one out with a 2 foot yam like root ... what a monster ...

ken

Well, in this part of the country the most invasive weed is Bindweed. It is actually in the Morning Glory family, and has pretty white or pink blooms. When friends or family from other areas of the country come for a visit, they always ask, what's that pretty flower that's blooming all over your yard? Before I knew what it was, the landscape guy that was putting in the sprinkler system and laying the sod, tilled up the dirt (new construction), and tilled all of the weeds under. Little did I know that each tiny piece would grow into a huge plant. Sod was laid in the fall, and by the next summer it was everywhere! Since I won't use chemicals on my lawn, I end up spending hours and hours each summer, pulling buckets full of the stuff, but it is futile. Like some of the other weeds mentioned, it is almost impossible to get all of the roots, and it will just grow back.

Bonnir

Bindweed for sure. And the worst thing about it is that you can't just rip it out- if it has wrapped itself around another plant you will end up defoliating the plant, lol! So first you have to cut it, then dig up the roots (not likely to get it all!), and then carefully take it off of the plant. Nasty thing.

-coolplantsguy, interesting about the Disporum. I was actualy thinking of buying that one or D. flavens. Do you know if flavens is rampant too? Sorry for going OT here....;-)
CMK

Wild violets.
And Creeping Charlie is trying to come in but he's still looking through the fence.

Purslane, yellow wood sorrel and sow thistle. The purslane and sow thistle are are the nastiest enemies. And yes I know the purslane is edible, put how many hundreds of pounds can one eat?

I am still trying to rid my beds of smilax vines after nine years.
Brush be Gone works some but not much.
On other note, wild onions are terrible because I have to hand dig each clump and they always come back for awhile.
I just created a new huge bed this summer and the onions are rampant. I won't plant in the bed until spring and have the bed cleared of most.

I have lots of weeds in various parts of my yard but the "worst" in terms of how much damage it could do to my garden (and how much panic it instilled in me) was dodder. I had no idea what this wacky, silly-string stuff was all over a half-dozen plants in an area of my cottage garden. It was as if it showed up overnight.

Then I was on a native plant walk at the NY Botanical Garden when the guide started talking about this horrible parasitic weed that can cover entire fields, and what she described was my silly-string! I almost died when I realized this is what had invaded my garden.

I waged a battle against it for a number of years. Finally I dug out many plants surrounding the area and let that border remain fallow for a couple years. So far this year it appears to be gone. I have read that seeds can stay viable in the soil for years and years so I'll remain on high alert!

Never heard of dodder. Interesting pictures. I'll be on the lookout.

stringy stuff reminds me of Hog Peanut which is actually dainty (appearing) vine -- Amphicarpaea bracteata. It runs wild in my wild uncultivated woods. I mostly let it be. I am pretty sure if I wanted to grow in that area, it would be a real problem.

And that section of my woods reminds me of my Jewelweed. I know some people love it, but it is incredibly invasive and gets into everything wicked bad. Travels fast and furious.

Then there is euyonmous fortunei coloratus. I actually planted 25 or so starts of it by design (not mine) on a sunny hillside 12-15 years ago. It was nice for a while but several years ago I noticed it was really moving a lot... into the surrounding woods and girdling trees and shrubs in its path. I did some trimming to contain it for awhile, but two years ago I decided that a partial solution would not suffice. It had to go completely. What a horrible job. I tried to kill it many ways. It would not die. Eventually I resorted to digging out all of it and letting it bake in the sun for a few weeks. I did this in sections for TWO YEARS. The tiniest bit of green stem would eventually grow a leaf. I still have piles of it that had some life in it going into this winter. I will be scrutinizing all the piles of allegedly dead stems this spring. I dump the debris in the woods so I have to be sure its really really dead before I call this job done.

Initially, I had put some of it in thick black plastic bags when I pulled it out. Two years later, they is some still alive IN THE BAG!!! Blanched euyonymous! its amazing stuff.

garlic mustard ...how do you eat this? Raw or cooked?

I never heard of dodder either. Very interesting. Although I'm sure you don't think so, thyme2dig!

:)
Dee

Ragweed. Ragweed everywhere. Luckily I do not have any allergies and I actually like the smell of them as I search and destroy all summer long.

bindweed, creeping charlie and nutsedge

I had a purslane and lambsquarters problem 8 years ago when we moved into this house, but we wiped them out with persistent eating. I actually purchased and planted purslane seeds for the past 2 years hoping to re-establish it a little (I guess the cultivated varieties are less weedy)

~Chills

Linnea--I make the garlic mustard into pesto (with walnuts and a little extra garlic), so raw for me. Supposedly garlic mustard was introduced here after being used as a pot herb by Europeans. I would guess, based on that, that you could cook it like any spinach or greens as well, though I haven't tried it.

Not a weed, but my nemesis for 2009 was stinkhorn fungus. I would gladly, gladly, take any of the aforementioned weeds in exchange for it. It's a perverted-looking fungus that grows from little eggs beneath the soil, and it is damn near impossible to eradicate. Just when you think you've dug it all out, it pops up three feet away. This was happening in an area right by my front door, and when they call it stinkhorn, they're not kidding. The smell is like nothing else.

My mom, God bless her, came over one day while I was at work and really went at it hard in that area, digging up hundreds of little eggs and treating with vinegar and baking soda. I didn't see anymore after that. I pray that it's gone. Horrible!

Oh, I had that stinkhorn fungus for the first time this year. We had a very wet spring and summer and it showed up in a wood-chip-mulched pathway.

Stupid me let it go when I saw it because I wanted to see it fully develop, having heard so much about it. Well, I regretted that. It stunk to high heaven and every day there was a new one in the path. I used a shovel to dig them out and threw them away with my blighted tomatoes.

We'll see what happens next year. I still can't believe that would be a bigger problem than that darn sheep's sorrel, though.

:)
Dee

Horsetail -- spent the first 5 years in each of my gardens getting rid of it

bindweed

quack and crabgrass

nothing else even comes close

David - nice to see you posting again! :0)

lily of the valley...hands down

Sheep's sorrel, now that I know what it is!!