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What is this vigorous plant / weed?!

GreedyGardenerGreedyGardener Posts: 14
in Problem solving

Hi Guys

I return with another request for help from all you fellow garden lovers.

I noticed this stuff springing up in a corner of my garden late last year... I'd thrown a load of mixed wildflower  seeds all around the edges of the garden, so I left it as the leaf looked nice and I assumed it would be one of the wildflowers. 

Now I'm concerned as it has completely taken over my garden and has sprung up in my fruit tree pots and all over my soil / beds.


Can anyone tell me what it is? It's not flowered at all but is spreading like wildfire.

Please helpimageimage

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Posts

  • BorderlineBorderline Posts: 4,700

    Have you seen any small flower buds yet? It looks like Rue to me.

  • BorderlineBorderline Posts: 4,700

    On looking at the shape of leaves, it looks  more like Catchweed. Are the leaves quite sticky?

  • Dave HedgehogDave Hedgehog Posts: 377

    Galium aparine - AKA Goosegrass, catchgrass, cleavers, sticky weed and many other names.

    Is easy to dig out with a hand fork but be careful as the lower stems are incredibly thin and often snap off leaving the shallow roots behind which will regenerate into new foliage. Hoeing it down regularly will see it off but take longer.

  • ObelixxObelixx Posts: 30,089

    Wear gloves.  It brings me out in a painful pink rash.

    Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
    "The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
    Plato
  • nutcutletnutcutlet Posts: 27,445

    I'm interested to know how it's spread everywhere if it hasn't flowered. I think it flowered last year but the flowers are insignificant little white things and you missed them.

    It's not Rue. It's a Galium. there are several. 

    Borderline asked if it's sticky. Is it?



    In the sticks near Peterborough
  • GreedyGardenerGreedyGardener Posts: 14
    nutcutlet says:

    Borderline asked if it's sticky. Is it?

    See original post

    Thanks for all the responses guys. No its not at all sticky and checked through the garden and none have flowers (yet)...

  • B3B3 Posts: 27,505

    It seems to be the year of the sticky Willy. I never saw it much before. It's everywhere in my garden, but it's easy to pull out.

    In London. Keen but lazy.
  • BorderlineBorderline Posts: 4,700

    I don't blame you thinking it's quite nice looking and leaving it and mixing it with your mixed flower seeds. Problem is, some plants are just too dominant and seems like you had it before and it's set seed and moved about. Birds, cats and the wind will do that for you. Wear protective gloves if you are pulling them out. The leaves can cause irritation. 

  • nutcutletnutcutlet Posts: 27,445

    Not sticky, not goosegrass/cleavers/Galium aparine

    I should think it came from the wildflower mix, that's the nature of wildflowers if they're happy, they spread.

    Might be Galium mollugo, (Hedge Bedstraw) or Galium album, (White Bedstraw), but there lots of them and I know very few



    In the sticks near Peterborough
  • granmagranma Posts: 1,933

    This is one of the banes of my garden . We call it goosegrass, it isn't sticky as such  but it's like the garden equivalent of Velcro. Clings by tiny hairs . Otherwise by little clinging seed   .....like  tiny sticky buds .

    Wear gloves,  this brings me out in a very sore  red rash ,giving the look ,equivalent  being whipped. (Not that I'd know anything It smothers everything .. the weight  of it will choke tender plants.

    easily gets out of hand . And  my final bit of advice ........get rid of it while it's young and before seeds pop..

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