I didn't plant them-they came naturally with the property--

yaupons

Sam

Petunias! Foisted on the public by the unscrupulous. Ghastly, leggy, ugly, nasty little growths that take up space from more deserving plants. In case you hadn't guessed, I HATE petunias!

I understand the intent of the word, but I wouldn't say I despise any plant because they all have a place in nature and a spot where they are beautiful such as this Purple heart Tradescantia pallida cascading over a wall at the San Antonio Zoo, but planted in the ground it can spread, be hard to remove, and become a nuisance.

I still have it in a pot or two where I can't get to it to water very often and there it is very colorful and pretty, but otherwise ... no thanks.

TRUMPET VINE!!!

And I have a love/hate relationship with barberries.

Blue mist flower Conoclinium (Eupatorium) greggii and coelestinum. So pretty, butterflies love them, but the roots are like twine and go on and on and on. Still pulling on them.
The other is St. Augustine grass. I can't wait till I can fill all my backyard with other things. One step at a time.......

Madame Galen trumpet vien, the other form, the pink is not so invasive.

I despise boxwoods. They're like a big green mustache, they take constant pruning, and they smell like cat pee! I also wage war on purslane, which reseeds EVERYWHERE! A pity, since it's so drought tolerant and pretty otherwise.

I tolerate my asian jasmine, because it's great cover, but it gets on EVERYTHING so I'm constantly pulling on it. The liriope is a nice plant, but I have so much I'm sick of it! When we moved into the house two and a half years ago, the only things in the yard were asian jasmine, boxwoods, liriope and purslane. Is it any wonder I'm sick of all that stuff?

Dewberries. It sounds so nice to have native fruit in your yard, right? Nope, those thorny little brambles are everywhere in my yard. I never happen to have my gloves on when I find them. Stupid thorns!
I also agree with the above opinions of trumpet vine. There was a very mature trumpet vine in my yard when I moved in and it was choking a nice oak. We cut down the trumpet vine and covered the area around the oak with landscaper fabric and SIX inches of mulch. Would you belive when I cut the fabric a year later to start planting the bed, what do I find? A lattice work of white, sickly looking trumpet vine roots! Now I have been killing the trumpet vine shoots for 2 years solid and they STILL keep popping up around the edges of the flower bed!

This is quickly going to turn into the Trumpet Vine horror thread! I despise this plant too. I pulled it out 4 years ago when it started destroying the fence. All the roots I could find came out, etc. I am still going out almost DAILY and pulling up little sprouts all over the place. Some are growing off of 1 inch or less branch pieces that fell on the ground and were buried at some point or other.

Only other plant I despise is blackberries. Same story. I can't get rid of them, and they are covered in thorns. So everytime I try to control them or get rid of them I look like I tried to give the cat a bath.

something called Ruellia (White )
not the dwarf kind.it got at least 4 feet in height
Olga,

Does anyone have a good way to grow blackberries/dewberries and keep them where you want them? I have some I'm planning to grow vertically. They're planted in a raised bed, and spilling over the sides right now - I'm going to go out soon and tie them to vertical supports and hope that works.

I'm afraid you're going to tell me it comes up from the roots everywhere and will show up on the other side of the yard.

FOUR O'CLOCKS! OMG I planted some in the backyard and they did so good and didn't get needy or clingy so when someone offered me a pot found in the trash of some kind of four o'clock i was thrilled to take it off their hands. holy moly, the tubers on this thing got three feet long and eight inches around. Now it has spread all over my raised bed and I cannot eradicate it. Do not fall pray to this 'little' plant.

good luck with your "vertical" blackberries. I tried it and it was just one big mess that I finally decided to face the bleeding arms and dig them up (and repeatedly spray with roundup). The thorns are just too much for me to deal with in trying to espalier them, and they sucker from the roots horribly.

Plants that I despise - elephant ears if they're loose in the ground. Around here they just take over the world - my neighbor planted some a few years ago and then panicked when they took over her yard, our yard, and escaped into the woods behind our homes. I'm still pulling out ee babies. Also, we fight cedar elm seedlings - they show up everywhere! (and I don't even have a cedar elm tree)

Bermuda grass.

'Nuff said. St augustine grass is so much better...

I'm with you Lou , Bermuda grass gets in the flower beds and you have to dig deep to get it out, if you can get it all.

DAY FLOWER, stay away from this one. Looks like a wondering jew, green leaves with blue flower. I thought I had pulled it all up last year but it's backkkkk ACKKKK. It will take over and you'll have nothing else.

Goats Rue Vine!!! Cant stand the stuff and it grows everywhere! I have been struggling to get it out of my rose beds but since they love to grow in the middle of the plant, its been a pain.

Another one is Seven Sister rose! It roots wherever it hits the ground. I chopped up some pieces of it and put it in our back yard thinking it would die....nope....new leaves coming off of it =(.

Let's see . . . things I have removed from my garden or will remove soon due to their aggressive behavior is ruellia - I had the pink one. I do have one left that is growing out by my mailbox, but have been pulling seedlings that were shot from this plant that are growing uphill from it at least ten yards away.

Lyreleaf sage is pretty, but be careful how you deadhead the finished flowers because the seeds will grow where they fall - even far away where you didn't think seeds may have fallen. There will be so many new little plants, it will drive you crazy!

Asian jasmine didn't last long in my garden. Once I saw how aggressive it was and the fact it was growing where I didn't want it, out it came. Bye, bye Asian jasmine. You are no longer welcome in my garden.

Bermudagrass . . . need I say anything else about this one? We all fight the little rhizomes on this one. The St. Augustine in the front is choking it out and I planted some SA sod pieces in the back, so hopefully in a couple years it will be choked out of the back too.

I used to have bluemist flower, but not anymore. It was pretty for a year or two, but after that - oh my goodness, did it become a bully! The butterflies loved it, but it wasn't worth it the way it was taking over my garden. I remember pulling up a thick mat of roots out of the garden that were at least four inches thick, and about 2'-3' wide and long mat of plants. I'd rather allow that one to grow in the wild.

missinformation - I grow the thornless blackberries - 'Navaho'. They are easy to tie onto a trellis and when they done producing for the year, you cut the old stalks all the way back to the ground and let the new stalks grow and tie those up as they grow. It is the same cycle every year. I wouldn't plant the thorny varieties due to all the work at getting in there to get berries and trimming back, tying, etc.

Johnson grass, wild morning glory (bind weed), nut grass
and cucklburs

'nuf said

Mexican Petunia, the tall purple one. I planted it 2 years ago in my garden, pulled it all out last year, but I'm still finding seedlings in that bed!

HONEYSUCKLE!!! Need I say more? I hate that stuff. Smells great, but is soooooo invasive.

Stephanie

In my yard something has to really be awful! Here's my hideous list.
Smooth brome (foxtails)they'll get in your animal's fur. This weed has spread from the tip of florida all the way to the top of Canada in N. America. It's hard to kill.
Bermuda grass is hideous!!!!! It is from another planet and is here to smother the whole planet!!!
Sandburs
Bindweed
Johnson Grass
Nutgrass
I actually like aggressive perenial flowers(blue mist,ruellia,goldenrod,maximillian sunflowers,day flowers etc..) but those crazy vines like Wisteria(Asian),honeysuckles(asian) and trumpet vine scare me too much to even plant! I hear they can tear up the house! PJ

Saponaria (bounching bet). It spreads like fire, has roots that break off when you attempt digging them up...not worth the blooms
molly

I agree with all thats been said. I hate youpon, but they're the reason I see so many birds. Cedar too. I could do with out the trumpet vine, but the hummers sure like it as they do bindweed. Mexican Petunia, liatris, 4pms, they like those also and so do the butterflies.

Bermuda. I wouldn't have grass in some places if it wasn't for bermuda. Is it in my flower beds? All the dang time. But if I tried to water st augustine I'd constantly be replaceing well pumps.

It's a love/hate relationship for me.

Mega dittos to the 4 o'clocks!! When we moved here (this is our third summer) the place had not been tended for a couple of years. They were EVERYWHERE! huge tubers. UGH

Also, beautyberries. they also were everywhere and just really, not that pretty of a bush in a woodsy yard.

Dorothy

cncnorman get those four o'clocks before they cover your yard!!
i've been digging them up for 6 seasons now and they still coming up everywhere and NOTHING kills them
they do smell nice, grow easily, feed the hummers but they are very invasive
trumpet vines are trying to take over mermaid rose and it's quite a battle!!
also blackberry vines in the flower bed- i never dreamed they'd be so hard to get rid of-they just volunteered and seem to be taking over!!

I pulled up a modest trumpet vine about 5 years ago. Every year, I have to cut some that comes up. It doesn't seem to care that I've cut off the green and laughed at me the first yer when I thought I could dig out the roots. I went about 6 ft before it broke off and laughed at me.

I would really like to see English Ivy be outlawed. My neighbor has a lovely bed of it that is contained. That's because it would rather move west through the hedge and into my azaleas and hydrangeas the out into the sun. Each year I cut it and pull it. I confess, It looks nice under the azaleas...it's the climbing over that gets to me.

She has a crew of yard guys com each week, I guess that's the only way to contain it. Now they've planted Asian jasmine!

Other than those, I like the invasive flowering things. I even like the vines. Make a flower and you're pretty much welcome here.

I despise Bermuda grass (and contrary to popular belief, a healthy St Augustine does not require more water than any other grass). There is no other plant that even comes close to my level of hatred for Bermuda grass.

'Nuff said.

Carla in Rowlett

I also hate bermuda in all it's forms. It grows up behind the siding on our garage and pokes out through power outlets and light switches. I hate the Johnson grass because of the huge brittle roots that can lift a building off it's foundation. Seems like no matter how much digging you do, you can never get these grasses out.

As for all the other weeds, like sand burrs and such, we got rid of a lot of them by treating our yard with zeolite, compost and cow manure. Enrich the soil with trace minerals, nitrogen, potassium and all the other good stuff it needs, and the really noxious weeds can't grow in it. We make our own compost, buy the zeolite, and bum the cow manure off our neighbors. Cow is better than horse only because of the extra stomachs and the weed seeds get broken down and digested by cows. Take a close look at the two and you can see whole seeds and whole weeds in horse manure. OK, or you can just take my word for it and you don't really have to look at them real close if you don't want to.

And after all that enrichment of our yard, and the sand burrs died out, it didn't do anything to erradicate BG and JG. I'm still fighting them.
Cheryl

Erg the weed in my yard that looks like wheat or grains. On the other hand I love my horse herb. It makes a nice ground cover. I've given up on having grass and dont miss it really. I rather spend time playing with my plants than babying a yard :)

I actually love 4 clocks but cannot get them to grow. I despise bermuda, but nothing else wants to grow well. I also despise this tree that came with the house. Kinda looks like a hackberry but with giganto thorns.

Wow! I am SOOOOOOO glad I posted this because I have a package of 4 o'clocks that I wanted to plant. We had them in Kansas when I was growing up and I LOVED them! That's amazing about the roots! So I take it that they're considered perennials here? What about growing them in a pot?

1. Nandina! How do people get rid of these things? I had one ground out with a stumpgrinder, but am still getting shoots.

2. Bamboo. Curses to the person who planted this behind our shed. Why???? There was no reason.

3. Bermuda grass, O most evil of weeds.

i grew up with 4 o'clocks too, they were planted like a foundation planting on a little country church just down the road from our house

even in a protected place in the burbs of houston, mine have only "stayed green and upright" one winter out of six

when we bought the house,they were so thick and tall, they almost hid the pool from the house (less than 10 feet) and some were 6 ft tall
right now i have several taller than a 4 ft fence

under different growning conditions, they might grow in a pot (a big pot)

they love our sandy soil and don't need fertilizer and if you spread some seed now, they might come up next year, i know they reseed themselves every year

if you have a place you can keep them contained and don't mind pulling volunteers all over the place, you might try them!!

English Ivy. Running Bamboo. I hated them. Next door neighbors had them and my dad would make me get rid of them every once in a while. Eventually, the owner sold the house and new owners decided to get rid of the bamboo the hard way. They are gone for good... Nobody is doing anything to English Ivy that is invading my parent's backyard from neighbors... Sometimes, I just want to pour gasoline on them and set 'em on fire!

Coral Honeysuckle! I know many people love it, but in my yard it took over a huge bed and killed everything else in it. I am still killing suckers that keep coming up a year later!

Ruellia, Bermuda Grass, Nut Grass

Ruellia the pink tall one. I loveed it the first 2 years. Linda Collins came over one day and said she could actually hear the seeds popping, I have it everywhere, and round up would not kill it. I dug up these hugh bushes and took to the dump. I have been pulling up all the baby plants for the past 4 months. I hope to have them gone by this fall.. I also hate bermuda and nut grass, round up will kill them. Barbra,

Asiatic jasmine! It was in this yard when we came in 2004 already and is on both sides of a shared fence as well as around some trees. It chokes everything and has no redeeming qualities in my garden - although I can understand using in places where it's totally surrounded by hardscape and cant't escape. There it can look neat and evergreen without being invasive.

Annie at the Transplantable Rose

BAMBOO! I have some if anyone wants to come dig it up. It's relentless!

rebecca, there was a 50yr old 20ft nandina along the front of my house when I moved it. It took me 2yrs (organically) to kill it. The whole problem wasn't the Nandina specifically Nandina is one of the few asian invaders that doesn't choke out the native understory(according to Sally Wasowaski's book TX native plants). It was that someone decided to plant a huge plant in FRONT of a floor to ceiling window! You couldn't see the window at all!!

I cut the nandina flush with the ground and covered the whole area with clear plastic in a VERY hot/dry summer.
I kept it that way for a year(not very attractive but all I could think of organically) The following year I cut and smothered the shoots that come up with black plastic. I haven't seen any new shoots in the third year so far. PJ

PJ~You can douse it with orange oil to kill off the remaining roots. Keep it covered and it should work.

I know this is an old thread, but I wanted to see if anyone else despised agaves? Apparently not.

To me, an agave is like a loud, ill-mannered, big-nosed & big-boned woman.--Ugly and obnoxious. Apparently, the word in Austin is, "If nothing else will grow, then plant an agave." So everyone has. They are everywhere. It's the invasion of the agave body snatchers! (All those agave pups are the souls of people who have fallen asleep and the agave got them.)

I heard a young man call into one of the Austin radio gardening shows recently to ask what the perfect Christmas gift would be for his mother-in-law who gardens in the hill country. The show's host recommended agaves. He said she'd love them. (((Shudder.)))

You would have to pay me to take one. Fortunately, there are Agave Snout-Nosed Beetles to help me out. (Smiling wickedly as I type this).

I plan to make big donations to the foundation for the pension and retirement plan of the Agave Snout-Nosed Beetle. They're so cute!

Here is a link that might be useful: Agave Snout Nosed Beetle

I agree redthistle. There's only one good reason to consider growing an agave.......Tequila!

Agave's might look right at home out in say, El Paso, but around here in central TX we have much better xeriscape options, IMO.

On that note, I'm not real fond of cactus around here either, especially prickly pear. Once again, in the desert, fine, but not here...

I give most Yuccas a free pass though. I don't feel they're quite as harsh looking and their flowers are pretty. Especially Red Yucca.

Bermuda grass--It must have roots that reach China and probably gives them heck trying to get it out of their flowerbeds too!! I expect any day to find it growing around the toilet, having drilled itself through the slab foundation! I have been able to get rid of the nutgrass by painting it with round up,using a tiny brush, but the bermuda seems to think this stuff is fertilizer. Also--does **anyone** know how to get rid of wild blackberry? It comes up everywhere and my neighbor actually killed a long portion of my privacy hedge spraying the blackberry underneath. Help!!! I'm shocked to read about 4 o'clocks. I have these memories of bushes from when I was a child and had planned to plant them this spring!! Maybe if I put them way at the back of the yard? But they have to have water, right? I just planted the tall Mexican petunia with plants from a swap! Should I go pull them out?!

Chickemom, I agree with you. Bermuda does have roots that reach to China. I have it and sadly, I think I always will. :-( Actually, you really might consider pulling the tall Mexican petunia out unless you don't mind having it everywhere.

We planted two or maybe three Mexican petunias years ago at our old place. Within two years, it was everywhere, even in the lawn and in the cracks of the sidewalk and in the shade. If it could have come into the house, it would have. One of my neighbors down the street has it now, and it's everywhere in his yard. Plus, I had a boss years ago who said she had a black thumb and couldn't grow anything. I gave some to her and 13 years later ran into her in the grocery store. She still has it (everywhere) and she rolled her eyes--if that tells you anything--when I mentioned it. Our Mexican petunias would literally pop (no joke!) its seeds out like little missiles when we'd water it. It sounded almost like popcorn popping.

Glad I'm not the only one not overly fond of agaves. :-)

I have been hit in the eye with a flying ruella seed. I broke an opal ring digging up Bamboo. We did succeed in containing the bamboo in cement and steel . It was beautiful but a chore. It grew in thick and tall. I had a day flower type flower that went everywhere. Even oxalis became invasive. It took over. The wandering jew and oxalis were a good combo. when the wandering jew was still frozen back to the ground the oxalis would be up and blooming and when in May it got rust and dies, the wandering jew took over. I just let the invasive plants duke it out. I got tired of the battle and put the house up on the market. Now I dig up every oxalis I see on my new property so I can maybe grow some succulents instead.. I did bring some of my plants from the old house and the soil was infected in oxalis corms. Now I just battle cedar. It is easy if you have a chain saw and a match. Out here it is KR bluestem and yellow clover that is proving troublesome. I had an infestation of crownvetch that gets me a ripping in the spring. Most plants that people have problems with is that they aren't giving the plant the room it needs to establish its natural colony. My grandmother had a whole hillside of blackberry. They made a lot of jam. The gregg's mist flower is great if you can give it it LARGE area. otherwise, don't bother. No one has mentioned Pampas grass. I hate cutting it back after a cold winter. Talk about bloody arms! New Zealanders call it sword grass. It made exploring the south island a real chore back in the old days and It has become quite invasive in Californian wetlands. The variety I had not very impressive blooms and the first august storm would drown out the plume pretty quickly. Maybe one of you guys bought my house and all the invasives, and are still swearing at me. LOL. I am much more careful of my choices, now. I have moved west of austin and invasiveness on this high rubble is not the issue. Getting anything to live out here is my challenge.