Black Medic: A Good Day to Die

Sometimes, where I live, we're lucky enough to get a blast of monsoonal moisture. The accompanying temperatures in the low 70s are a gift after days of temperatures nearing 100.  Of course, plants love this reprieve as much as we do, and I'm happy for that. I'm also happy that all the moist soil makes for perfect conditions for some weed murder - a good day to die. Today I went after the usual suspects I've mentioned previously (the creeping bellflowers and the bindweed) but added a new victim to the list. On my last stroll through my beds, I noticed the tell-tale yellow puffballs of black medic. Unlike the bindweed and bellflowers, this enemy doesn't use its roots to wreak havoc, so fortunately, it's easy to pull it out with a digging tool. It's satisfying, too, because pulling one central root often takes out several thin offshoots. Black medic's real danger lies in its seeds; each yellow puffball matures into a head of seeds that will yield more weeds. Go after it as soon as you notice its yellow face popping up in your garden, or you'll be faced with even more of it next year.



Here's a helpful link to educate yourself about this little weed. Gardening Know-How: Getting Rid of Black Medic  The author is certainly optimistic and tries to convince you that finding black medic in your garden is a great thing because it alerts you to the underlying problem: that you have compacted soil. OK... Whatever, the remedy is to pull it, and by pulling it, I've loosened up the soil. Like a boss.

Killing Bindweed

If Christian Grey were a plant, he'd be bindweed. Deeply twisted and into bondage.

And if Fifty Shades of Grey were a plant, it would be...bindweed. Crap and fast-spreading.

I haven't read the whole novel let alone the whole series - a quick skim of several pages was enough for me to make a snap judgment. I wish I had done the same with the Twilight series, but no. I had to do some research on the character. Luckily, there are whole wiki pages devoted to the Christian Grey character.  Of course there are.

Twining up the daisies: "You will be mine!"

Like so many evil plants, bindweed looks innocent enough. A member of the morning glory family, this delicate little vine with white blooms sidles up to any shy nearby plant and twirls daintily around it.  You'd be tempted to let it grow, let it grow. No. Don't do it because you'll soon realize that you can't hold it back any more.

Bindweed, or Convolvulis arvensis, is the enemy. I'll just call him Christian, ok?  Check any gardening message boards for tips on how to get him out of your garden and you'll see helpful hints about the use of "napalm" or suggestions to "just move out" or "go ahead and die; that weed will outlive you." Christian is a survivor. Yank him out of the ground, he'll grow back with double the power. Dig him up, he'll defy you with his roots that can sink over 9 feet (some sources say 40!) into the soil and can lie in subterranean wait for 20 years. No wonder so many people suggest napalm.

Pull me! Pull me again!

Apparently, there are a few things that work to curb Christian's voracious appetite for bondage and domination of other plants, but none are quick fixes. Pulling does apparently work if you are willing to stay vigilant watching for new growth. We're talking pulling it up every three weeks for three years to cut off any nourishment to its roots. I noticed that Christian reacts to pulling in the same way that Christian Grey reacted to his honey Anastasia defying him - he becomes more aroused. For Christian, arousal looks like this - a flush of hundreds of tiny leaves. As a gardener, I feel like this is the plant giving me the finger: "You dare to pull me from the ground? Really? You thought I was bad before? Look at THIS (plant proceeds to shoot up 5,000 new leaves as sign of defiance.)

all up in the club

This clearly rules out the option of tilling. Even a small piece of root can develop into a new plant. Heed my advice here, or you'll soon find that your garden is one big S&M club with all your flowers and vegetables being choked into submission. My neighbors across the alley are promoting this kind of obscenity. Every time I take out the trash, I'm tempted to plan a midnight guerrilla weed-warfare mission.


I don't know about you, but I don't know if I have the discipline to keep pulling and pulling each time Christian shows his face in my garden. Weeding has helped keep the bindweed under control enough that it hasn't choked out all the other plants, but I really do want it gone. The problem is that it's hard to find the new growth because Christian is one sneaky plant. One day you'll see no sign of him then the next he's party-boying a poor unsuspecting stem in a mosh pit of Shasta daisies. It would be hard to keep up with pulling him repeatedly off his many "girlfriends" or "submissives" when he's so...busy. I do pull the small ones when I see them and try to stay on top of the problem. In my view, though, pulling isn't effective enough on its own.

That is why this summer I chose chemical warfare. I know that I should avoid that. I should do things the organic way, the natural way. Like many of you, I've seen pins on Pinterest about vinegar being a magical natural weed killer. It may work on some lesser opponents, but it won't work on Christian. His roots are too deep and twisted, and according to my research, vinegar would just knock back the top growth and leave the roots alone ready to strike again.

Apparently the best type of herbicide to use on Christian is anything that is glyphosate-based. The most popular brand is Round-Up. The trick is getting the Round-Up onto Christian as he's embracing his girlfriends (neighboring plants.) You can't let any overspray get on more desirable plants, or they'll die too. And they'll likely be knocked out permanently, unlike Christian who will need repeated applications of herbicide to knock him out.

Take that! 

Here's what I've done to try to wipe him out in my flowerbeds. I mix up a bit of Round-Up concentrate with water- following the package directions. OK, not quite according to the directions. I admit that I mix it up stronger because I want those weeds DEAD.  I paint the mixture onto the plant with a small sponge brush that I keep in my garden shed just for this purpose. My goal is to have all the weapons on hand so that I can attack whenever necessary.

There is research online about fall being the best time to kill Christian or that humid days are best or that it's best to wait until he flowers. In my experience, waiting for the perfect conditions for anything is just asking to fail. Waiting for perfection is my main reason for procrastination and is just a recipe for problems getting waaaayyy out of hand. I figure that whatever I do will be better than letting the enemy advance. I know I must do whatever it takes to keep him from flowering and multiplying further.

The "fighter" 2 days after Round-Up

I've made some headway in my fight this summer. I wiped out all the bindweed coming up along the fence between my neighbor's house and my flower beds. I've destroyed all of it in the sections of red landscaping rocks that still plague my existence. And I've decreased it greatly in my flower beds.

As an experiment, I plan to use some wooden skewers to mark a couple that I've pulled and a couple that I've painted with Round-Up. I'll let you know what was more effective over the long haul.

I know I'm not finished and that there will be sequels to this story. I hope I don't have to experience Fifty Shades Darker and that eventually I get to Fifty Shades Freed. Someday, I tell myself, I'll be free of Christian and his control of my flowerbeds. And if there's hope for me, there may be hope for you too. I'll keep you posted, and if you have any tips in fighting this persistent enemy, let me know.

You Gotta Be Cruel to Be Kind

I've decided that annuals (petunias, marigolds, begonias and the like) are the trophy wives of the flower garden. If you want vivacious blooms all summer long, annuals are your best bet. But like a trophy wife, you're going to pay...and pay...and pay as you "trade up" each year.

Perennials, however, are the old reliable. Think of them as a wife (or husband) of 25 years or so. They stay around and are there for you every spring, but you can't count on them to keep looking and behaving their best day in and day out if you're not willing to work a bit on some routine maintenance. Just like a successful marriage, right?

If you're a perennial newbie, you may not realize that, unlike annuals, perennials don't typically bloom all summer long. Even if a plant description says that the plant will produce all summer, don't expect a trouble-free, plant it and forget it kind of situation. 

For one, you have to deadhead. No, I'm not referring to fans of Jerry Garcia and the Dead of the Grateful Variety. I'm talking about removing spent or dried-up blossoms from a plant. Why is this necessary? Flowers are meant to ensure the survival of the plant. If a flowering plant has several blooms and the blooms dry up in order to drop seeds, the plant is done blooming. Think of it as a woman entering menopause or maybe a woman in heavy labor. It's DONE. If it could speak, it would say, "I've DONE my job. I REPRODUCED! Is that not ENOUGH for you? By deadheading, you trick the plant into producing more and more flowers because it thinks it must produce more offspring to carry on the family name, so to speak. Let's take a moment and bow our heads in thanks that no one deadheads us to keep us popping out offspring. Two blooms were enough for me. 

Check out this scabiosa (ugly name for a beautiful plant - you can call her a pincushion flower if you want to be common.) 

This bloom is DONE.

She's a prolific bloomer, but she won't keep pumping out these lovely lavender blooms if you don't remove the dead ones. You just need to observe the plant to figure out which are the spent blossoms and which are the buds about to explode into fabulousness. You could just pinch off the head. (You're probably pretty good at this if you used to deadhead dandelions in this fashion: Grasp dandelion stem and put thumb right below the flower. Chant "Momma had a baby and its HEAD popped off!" popping your thumb up on the word HEAD to behead the poor thing. Childhood's a brutal time, innit? ) Back to the scabiosa, though. I don't like to just pop off the bloom because then you have this sad stem with no flower. Pretty ugly. I think it's better to run your fingers down to the bottom of the stem above the first leaf and then snip it there with your pruners. These Fiskars pruners are just the thing for the job.  If you just take a few minutes once a week or so, you'll be able to maintain this plant and prolong her bloom. 

Catmint (Nepeta Walker's Low)
in all her glory

Catmint is a great plant for my growing zone (zone 4/5) up here in the high country with very little rain. Bees adore this plant because there are billions of blooms on all her lavender spikes. Though she gets fairly big (this is only year two for mine), Catmint is a well-behaved plant that stays in a clump and is fairly trouble-free. 

Catmint in need of a haircut

 However, you can see that now that it's early July, she's kind of looking tired. I did some research online to check to see whether cutting it back would help. Yep. Simply cut off the tired old flowers with some garden shears. 

I'll be back...

It's not looking so hot here, and I'm sure the bees hate me, but give it a few weeks and it will be back in the baby business. 

poor, faded salvia

The same method applies for perennial salvia. Mine is Salvia May Night. She's a gorgeous dark purple while in full bloom but starts getting pretty ratty and faded in early or mid-July - kind of like me when it's time to head to the salon to get my hair color redone. I cut back salvia by running my fingers down to the base of the stem with the blooms then cutting. The added bonus for pruning salvia is that she's less likely to get gangly and flop from the center, which can be a problem in mid-summer. 

Dianthus are bustin' out all ohhhver!

With some flowers, you're not deadheading to extend their bloom but rather to tidy up your garden. One example is this beautiful wave of dianthus. They're tiny carnations and have that same wonderful spicy smell. Amazing. 

Girl, you look better in pink. Just sayin'

What's not so amazing is that they only bloom for a few weeks then are done.  Once they're done blooming, you're left with dried up brown blooms. I like fall colors but not so much in my summer garden.

The best way to deadhead dianthus is to go after them with some sharp garden shears then lift out what you've cut off. Sure, you could use a weedeater, but that's like doing surgery with a chainsaw. Not only will you risk murdering some innocent plant bystanders but you'll also end up with chewed up stems that will turn brown, leaving you back at square one. Dianthus are not bad-looking once they're cleaned up. These have spread beyond their boundaries, so I may have to tear some of them out to leave room for the Autumn Joy sedum that it's crowding out. You gotta be cruel to be kind!  The sedum will bloom late summer, and there are some coneflowers behind those that will be starting their show any day. 

a few blooms had to die for the greater good

If you've got some pent-up frustration (maybe from that trophy wife issue), you can really go to town while deadheading a plant that holds its blooms out on longer stems. The flower stems on these Johnson's Blue geraniums stand out far from the base plant like nasty spider legs, so just grab on and give the stems a good yank. I've had good luck with these blooming later in the summer, and even if they don't, they have a nice mounded shape while you wait for more color. 

Hopefully, you won't give up on those perennials that seduced you in the Home Depot garden section. With a little tough love you'll probably coax them into performing for you before you trade them in for new in-bloom models.   

If you want to know more about how to care for and love your plants over the years, this gem of a book is a great resource: 

The Well-Tended Perennial Garden