veteran gardeners - can you help me with this mystery plant?

[liquidclocks]

this weed is rampant in my garden and I need to know what it is - sorry, I couldn't upload a picture to this thread hence the link to the one in member profiles.

I'd be very grateful for any ideas. Thanks.

It looks like sun spurge to me is it
1/ growing in recently cultivated / disturbed ground?
2/ Does it weep a white sap when picked?

If it is sun spurge it is part of the euphorbia family and the sap can cause skin irritation particulary when it is exposed to sunlight

Thanks albatros - yes to both points, we moved about 6 months ago and the garden hadn't been touched for years so I'm assuming it's because there's years build up of seeds in the soil - is there anything you know of that I can use to stop it spreading - so far i'm just pulling it up wherever it appears (getting tough at 37wks ow!).

Thanks for the reply btw!

oops - just found this on wilkipedia "It is highly poisonous. Active ingredients are extracted from it for use in pharmaceutical industry"

• I'll be putting my gloves on to pull it up in future!

It also says it a purgative so I suppose it could be causing my pains so I'm not going nutty imagining things.

Thanks albatross - it had been bugging me for months not knowing what it was.

its a triffid of course

It is an annual weed so if you hoe it it should kill it and then you don't need to touch it at all. It does not spread from its roots just from seeds, could you mulch the areas that it grows in? then the seeds will not be exposed to sunlight and so will not grow.

Thanks albatros - I'm such a newbie to gardening - really enjoying it but there's so much to learn!