Thanks Heidi. I should ask the company about the product just targeting seeds. I want the plant to spread but from what it has done in growth without seeding, should be an indication about who hardy it is just as a plant. I'm just sick of the weeds coming back all the time. I don't mind the occasional plucking and pulling, but after every rain I'm just back to square one again.

Some milkweeds are perennials but many are annuals and depend on being able to germinate. Managing a prairie or native planting is all about the balances.

There is no absolute objective meaning to the word "weed". One person's weed is another person's agricultural crop. It depends on the use you are putting the plant to. Herbicides don't know the difference.

Most true weed killers will kill ANY plant...and that includes the organic weed killers. Tere are a few fancy weed killers that don't hurt grass, afew genetically modified plants immune to round up.

True pre-emergent's don't kill adult plants, they just keep seeds from sprouting. Useful if you have a bed full of bulbs and perennials and don't want annual weeds to reseed into it. It will also stop natives from reseeding.

Any sort of milkweed was considered a weed when I was younger. I'd guess that opinion started to change after word about the decline in monarch populations started to get out.

As your planting density increases you'll have less weeds to worry about. It's tough in the meantime. I've used various mulches in my beds (chicken grit, for instance), with the idea that once the ground is covered with natives I won't need to do that, but I still have to do a lot of weeding, especially along the edges. A dutch hoe helps.

I'd be wary of preemergents in a bed of natives. If you must do it, try it in a fairly small area first.

The use of the word "weed" is nothing more than a convention here. Milkweed-as a native plant-simply cannot be considered a true weed. Actual weeds are plants from somewhere else-nearly always brought forth due to agriculture-that go on to multiply. They are nearly all invasive plants in this respect, with the degree of invasiveness largely being controlled by their degree of shade tolerance. So, the common dandelion is both a weed and a hugely successful invasive species, but........it cannot invade woodlands and thus will never displace whole plant communities the way say, garlic mustard can. Nor is it tall enough to replace prairie plants in regions where that plant community is prevalent.

I already hear the charge of "semantics" coming down the pike. I've been through this before. If you think a weed is any unwanted plant-something I've heard right around 500 times by now-I'm sorry, you're wrong! Oh, sure, I'm lol'ing. But I'm also serious.

I agree completely, though as a homeowner with a small property -- on a practical basis -- there isn't much difference to me between a true weed as you define it and an unwanted native plant. I am pulling tons of Virginia creeper, pokeweed, oak, sweet gum, and redbud seedlings out of my beds lately. I'd be fine with them in the right setting -- and in fact I do have some Virginia creeper on the back fence -- but early-successional forest just isn't going to work in the small space I have.

A pre-emergent isn't going to make any distinction between native and non-native either. I'd be concerned about unintended damage to the native plants I have put so much effort into establishing.

Consider this excerpt from the Dimension 2EW (a pre-emergent) label:

Specific Use Precautions and Restrictions:

• Apply Dimension 2EW to established ornamentals only.
• Do not apply this product to bare roots of ornamental plants as injury may result.
• Do not incorporate this product into the soil. Dilution of active ingredient and possible injury to plant roots may occur.
• Do not apply around ornamental plants that have been weakened or are under stress (due to drought, flooding, excessive fertilizer or soil salts, wind injury, hail, frost damage, winter injury, injury from previously applied pesticides or injury due to insects, heat stress, nematodes or diseases).
• Do not apply when weather conditions favor drift to non-target areas. This product may injure foliage of non-target plants unless they are listed on this label.

Yup. I used to use Surflan-a well-known pre-emergence herbicide on this city's flower beds. I inherited a mess, and felt I had to use every tool at my disposal to get things under control. Then, after a few years, I noticed what I thought to be a bit of off-target effects on some of my ornamental plants. We then discontinued the use of this or any other pre-emergence product. But for a while there, I think they helped us.