Got alligators?

That was a lot of work! I hope that you got it all out!

No idea on the egg, I would have guessed snake, they are too elongated for tortoise. You are too far east for Gila Monsters?

I'm thinking the egg was probably in the mulch that the tree trimmer guys dumped for my use. The pile was there for a few years before I got it all spread, so maybe something washed down from the nearby creek and laid eggs in the warm environment.

Or even more exciting maybe the mulch came from the zoo and an exotic creature now lives in the woods ready to drop out of a tree ... lol

It may forever remain a mystery, but I'd still like to know.

Pam, yes it was a lot of work to extract all those roots, but I knew it had to be done. Anyway, Bob did the hardest part ... :-)

I have some verbena rigida in one bed and last year decided to pull it out. Didn't bloom very often and popped up between all the other plants. Still yanking it. Looks like yours spread a lot more. Thankfully it's in a small bed and blocked from spreading by a sidewalk.

It is a turtle egg. Look around and you will likely find several more.

Thanks Kentuck. So you'd say that's the general shape of land turtle eggs?

I've found ornate box turtle eggs which are the turtles I have, but turtles that lay as large an egg pictured above can't get in our yard so whatever it is, it must have gotten here via the mulch.

Probably, it was carried in with the mulch. Looks like a waterturtle egg judging from it's size. I find them everywhere here, inside and outside of my yard.

Goodness... what a job! How much time did the sandpaper verbena have to get established like that? Not much said elsewhere about this characteristic, so thanks for the word of caution. Sorry it came as the voice of "experience".

I planted one little plant about two and a half, maybe three years ago, at the most. I wanted so much to look over it's spreading since it's such a good bloomer, but my friend's experience woke me up to the fact that I had no time to loose if I wanted have control of that planting bed.

I did a quick search on the internet to see if anyone else had noted this propensity and didn't find anything. Usually Dave's site is good for that, but there was not much about it there.

I just now looked at Dave's Garden again and while I don't see any "negatives", upon reading through the comments I see that a couple of people in Texas give a hint of possible problems:

"Verbena rigida happily grows in lawns and roadside easements in
Central and Coastal Texas. I've seen it thriving in soggy ditches and
hard-pan road embankments. Its tuberous roots enable it to survive
drought conditions and may go dry-dormant. With regular watering, this
plant may spread rapidly but if you like deep purple verbena flowers for
months on end and butterflies, you probably won't mind the occasional
need to pull up stray rhizomes."

This 'neutral' comment does post a 'warning':

"I do very much like the purple display this plant makes, which pretty
much never stops, except in the dead of winter, which by the way does
not actually do much harm to this plant in zone 8. It is indestructible
once it gets started, just some dead top growth again in the winter. Now
on to the reason for this post. Warning for Verbena rigida. In zone 8
this plant is winter hardy and will spread with runners (lots), suckers
(again, lots), and seed (few). It is very slow to start but after the
first year be prepared to mow it down all around wherever you are trying
to contain it, which it really can't be contained 100%. Mine came as
seed with some other wildflower seed I ordered. Prolific bloomer and
holds the blooms for a very long time, leaves are sharp to the touch and
somewhat serrated."

I think that it is like the difference between a thug and an invasive. It does not behave in small spaces of a mixed bed. It wants its very own AREA and will take it. No questions asked. I live out in an area where I am worried about introducing things that escape so I decided against it.

Thanks - I hesitated in trying it as an alternative to 'Homestead Purple' verbena, which is not very robust in our yard, and am now a happy procrastinator. :-)

Four years later a seed of Verbena rigida sprouted in the same bed. I didn't recognize it until it bloomed. I'm tempted to plant it in four ft square hell strip bed in front which is surrounded by the side walk, street, and drive ways on each side where it can't spread, or can it? Dare I?

I yanked mine out 15 years ago and I still get a volunteer every once and awhile.