When I saw this quote/paraphrase from Sir Mixalot’s 1992 hit in my local gardening group, I thought, “Finally. Somebody gets me.”
My gardening life is punctuated by love/hate relationships with plants that have to be cut back and selectively pulled out on a regular basis. Trumpet vine, wisteria, anemone canadensis, sweet woodruff, lily of the valley, and ostrich fern are a few that can be oh-so-readily named. Vigorous climbers are needed to help screen the garden from a neighboring property and, at one time, wisteria was doing a great job there. It did not pull up paving, tear down trees, or tear down structures, as commonly-seen dire warnings advise. Eventually, though, it all fell down on its own during a pruning mishap and I easily pulled the rest out. I’ve never seen it since. I’ll admit that trumpet vine is another story, but I loved it while I had it and I still admire it in other gardens.
Anemone canadensis came through wildflower seeds and didn’t do much until it woke up a few years back and began to spread. It pulls out easily, though, and I love the long-lasting white flowers and handsome serrated foliage. Sweet woodruff is one of the few groundcovers for dry shade that I can tolerate. I’ll always have it. Ostrich fern—well, I would love to have a lush, waving bed with nothing but this in it. Still working toward that.
As long as the plants aren’t on New York State’s DEC invasive list, I’ll always be looking for easy spreaders with the word “vigorous” on their labels. My combination of dry full shade and partial shade makes it necessary to be tolerant, but I also love the wildness of it. I like having plants I can barely control. I cannot lie.
Image at top: Anemone canadensis, Japanese maple, sweet woodruff, heuchera, and lamium are having an early June get-together here.
Right with you. We should start a campaign to support poor maligned thuggy plants – they are sometimes the only thing that saves a spotty ‘one of everything’ garden.
Spending too much time pulling out Anemone canadensis, but it’s a lovely green mulch under my tree peonies.
I also love the bad boys. Your list is different than mine, though: gooseneck loosestrife, pale pink (dis)obedient plant, and Northern Sea Oats. As for gooseneck loosestrife, how I wish it would behave just a little! It is such a lovely plant, but alas, it seems eventually a gardener needs to rip it out. Disobedient plant seems impossible to eradicate. Happily, though, after ripping it up in my gardens, some popped up in the crack between my front stoop and the walkway. It is a lovely stand of plants that stays put, blooming against the pillar of my front stoop area. The worst one of all is Northern Sea Oats. Again, such a lovely plant, but alas, thug seems too mild for this miscreant. I ripped it out 3 years ago, and I still have it springing up in my front garden. Just pulling it doesn’t do the trick; you need to dig it out by the roots. (Thank God for kids, right?) I just bought a sweet woodruff plant for the circle garden around my front dogwood, and it seems I’ll need to keep an eye on it. I dug up some lily of the valley from a kind elderly woman in my town. Despite its reputation, it sat put, doing nothing, for probably six years. This year, though, I notice it spreading a little, much to my delight. But again, I’m going to watch it like a hawk.
I love gooseneck loosestrife. I lost it when we put in the pond. Sometimes, the thugs are not thuggish at all. Porcelain Vine is actually on the NYS DEC list, but I have spent 5 years coaxing it over a trellis. There is a great post by Michele Owens in our archives on flag iris. Check it out.
Thank you, for this rant. I and my lily of the valley, periwinkle, day lilies, scilla, etc. agree.
hay-scented fern, my favorite bad girl.
I love garden thugs too – I have Rose of Sharon sprouting up all over the place, perennial ageratum run amok, Spanish bluebells galore, siberian iris breaking out of its border, lamium that has tripled in size, and rose campion that has reseeded all over the place and I love the look of it. I love when areas look like they’ve been mass planted. I’ve been tempted to plant sweet woodruff and ostrich fern around some trees in the back yard but haven’t yet. I just planted crocosmia which I’m told can take over an area…I hope so! The only thing I’ve regretted planting is lemon balm as it strangled everything near it. I had to rip it all out which took years.
Nice rant Elizabeth
Iave a saying,
“It is a fine line between a well spreading perennial and an invasive plant.
Tending to a very mature, mostly perennial garden, pushing 2000 sq ft in very rich soil in Covington Ky, can be challenging. We rarely fertilize, I’m afraid to.
This garden is very much a lasagna garden, early layers of things that come and go through out the season. Swaths of purple crocus, grape hyacinth give way to daffodils. Then the floodgates open.
Some invasive plants came from well meaning friends, years ago when we had ground to cover and weren’t as smart. Each season it seemed there was some out of control plant we try and eliminate, bishops weed. Pachysandra, campanula, buttercups, white bee balm.
Some seem newer additions of our own choosing have started to become a little much. Virginia bluebell, although it makes a graceful early exit. Brunnera is starting to cross the line. Oddly Hellebores are becoming a little over the line. Even some hostas, epimedium and Lilly of the valley are walking the line.
The loss of our ancient white male mulberry shade tree is going to change a large part of the yard.
Anyone need some well spreading shade plants?
I would love to have a beautiful garden, but I’m too lazy to have it. So, I’m grateful for the vigorous growers you call “thugs.” Most of the plants considered “invasive” have never been anything other than survivors in my garden. My wisteria in San Francisco never went far…not more than 6 feet up its trellis after 10 years. The clumper bamboo made a great screen from my neighbors without going out of bounds. Buddleia lasted less than a year. Here in the East Bay, the anemone I planted several years ago is barely hanging on.
All the talk about out-of-control plants makes me wonder. Does it mean that my microclimate is much more unfavorable than others’? Or soil conditions? Gardeners who think they can plant and walk away without managing the landscape? Who knows?
I was nodding in agreement at the comments, because I have many of these same thugs as well. More perversely, I tolerate some thug weeds as well: jewel weed, dame’s rocket, and daisy flea bane. Some control is mandatory, but they are too attractive to eradicate. There, I said it!
Tough plants for tough places.
My thing is I don’t want to see any dirt.
I love foliage and the color green.
So something is going in there.
It becomes like tribal management, who is invading who. What plant is being well behaved, who has lost favor, who gets dug out.
The Moody Blues perhaps said it best.
“It’s a question of balance”