"Ann" wrote in message
...
"Mary Fisher" expounded:

I didn't see the pictures :-(

But aquilegia, columbine, is a weed in this garden, I can't get rid of
it -
any of the colours!

Mary, I don't want to know theexact name of the town or anything, but
what part of England do you live in? When I was there I remember you
had the most marvelous weeds - I actually have columbine weeds here in
this yard, but not the other that were over there in southern England.
Mum and I went on a garden tour there back in 1997 or so. Went to the
Chelsea Garden show and then took a coach tour around southern and
western England, it was wonderful!

We're a long way (in English but not US terms) from Chelsea and even further
from the south and west :-)

I'm in inner city Leeds, Yorkshire, exactly 200 miles from London in the
south and Edinburgh in the north.

Columbine isn't regarded as a weed, many folk buy plants and seeds of it.
But it's a weed in my garden in that it spreads and spreads and is very
difficult to get rid of, I can't pull it up. In more than forty years it's
beaten me :-)

We have a different botanical environment from the south in that we're
cooler and can't grow the tender plants which thrive further south. So
saying, I agree that some 'weeds' are lovely. All my neighbours try to get
rid of daisies on their lawns, when we had a lawn I couldn't grow them.
Coltsfoot grows in cracks in the pavement, no matter how I try I can't get
it to grow in my garden - even in cracks in the paths! Then there's
dandelion - if it were rare everyone would want the beautiful flower and
would marvel at the symmetry of its seed head. Elder is regarded by most as
a tree weed but I was saddened when we lost the one overhanging our garden
from a neighbour's, we lost our source of lovely flowers which I used to
make elderflower fizz. We have a wild rose, the eglantine, at the bottom of
our garden which delights us with its dainty blossom in summer months and
the bright red hips in the dark winter ones. I use those for cordial and
jelly of course :-)

Most of my garden plants provide food - for us, for birds and for insects,
if they're just for show I don't really want them. But I'm regarded as an
oddity ...

Mary


--
Ann, gardening in Zone 6a
South of Boston, Massachusetts
e-mail address is not checked
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