What do you regret planting in your garden?

[MyRabbit79]

Inspired by the current thread about the plants and weeds people are currently battling, what are the plants you've purposely sown or planted in your garden and come to regret?

For me, it's aquilegia and forget-me-nots.

I bought some aquilegia for our front garden when we moved here and it pops up everywhere, looks messy and I don't love the flowers

Forget-me-not - I sowed these from seed two years ago out the front. They're now everywhere including in the pots, gravel and back garden. Planning to pull most of it up after it's flowered this year.

Bloody variegated ivy. Was here when we moved in 25 years ago, we’re still in a war with it today.

This weekend BIL brought his chainsaw round, so Easter Sunday was a large Christmas dinner style lunch followed by working it off massacring the wretched thing (I’m pissy because it overwhelmed one of my wonderful lilacs in about 5 minutes).

And my Russian vine on my back fence has had a talking to too. I keep showing it bits of the ivy to scare it into slowing down its rampage when I dump it onto my compost heap (beautiful in the autumn with it’s red leaves, pain in the arse at every waking moment during the other 3 seasons).

Oh god my lupins are the same. They did well the first year and then every year since have been covered in aphids.

@7catsisnotenough oh I’d LOVE to have a lily of the valley patch! It reminds me of my mum, I plant it every year and if I’m lucky I get one or two flowers but that’s all, and it never comes back to following year. Not sure what I’m doing wrong but obviously something!

Spanish bluebells. I had an Aunt who tried for 25 years to get rid of them but never could. I thought if I dug really deep and wide and pulled up all the bulbs I'd get rid of them but it made no difference

Me too! Nothing grows in my bloody garden, except muscari. I've even toyed with buying Rosa 'Kiftsgate' as apparently it's capable of basically covering a house in the space of a year or two. I bet I could just about get a nice little shrub out of it 😆

My friend ex husband, bloody patio has had now subsided..

Crocosmia
'Dwarf' raspberry and blackberry
Japanese sodding anemones - started off in tiny pots but rampaged
Alliums - dug them up, yet there they are

I have limited physical ability, so my partner is an absolute saint when it comes to removing plant thugs.

Foxgloves are reseeding everywhere this year, but I adore them. Also, I was too strict on deheading forget-me-nots, so I'm glad that some have reappeared. I may regret these pleasures in due course, admittedly.

things i inherited in my gardent hat are really invasive:

grape hyacinths. bloody drowing the borders, look pretty for about 5 minutes
wild garlic, again drowns everythign and comes up betweent he stones in the patio
aqueligia, all naturalised now so flowers are dull and boring, really hard to dig out, seeds EVERYWHERE
euphorbia, bloody horrible ugly thing thats hard to get rid of
next door's privet hedge that keeps sending shoots under the fence
next doors ivy, keeps sending shoots under the fence.
virginia creeper, no matter how much you cut it back it comes back 3 x the size. ONly slightly mitigated by its glory in autumn

brambles and bind weed, but to be fair I don't think they planted that.

On the other hand
Bamboo
We have a large patch of bamboo, and it is glorious. We hack it back to half the size every spring and it shoots up all around and we have to keep on top of it, but it is tall and willowing and graceful and green all year and hides the shed and looks actually fab. To me it is worth the effort (and we have enough space for a decent size clump which helps)

Brazen Hussy celandine
Forget-me-nots
Acanthus
Bergenia
Euphorbia
Nigella
Spanish bluebells

And grape hyacinth- I yank out buckets full every year 🤬

Stupid lavender border. It grew, huge and ugly. Not at all like the lavender borders you see pictures of. It's miserable looking and isn't proving easy to dig out.

I have hardy geraniums absolutely everywhere in my garden (I didn't plant them I think they must have migrated from a neighbour). The roots are horrendously deep and strong, does anyone have any tips for making them a bit easier to dig up?

And everyone saying don't plant forget me not, I have a packet of seed given by my vet when my cat died and I really want to plant them in memory of her. If I plant them in a patio tub would that contain them?

Thank you

We had this in our last garden. Was a nightmare. We've since moved and mainly seem to be inundated with weeds. This is a useful thread though for those things to avoid when we get it sorted out!!!

I have forget-me-nots and aquileqia and love both of them, I just pull them out if they're somewhere I don't want them (my garden is not huge tho...)

DH planted a laurel about 10yrs ago and I finally dug it out last year, I was sweating by the end, felt like some kind of savage garden warrior as I battled with the roots!

Sorry about your cat. Given that my self seeding forget me nots invade my patio tubs (I could easily remove them but I like them), I doubt yours will stay put unless you mercilessly pull them up before they start to set seed. But as they're to remember your cat by, I'd be happy with them running free!

Am thinking of digging mine up this year. I don't know what possessed me to plant it.

The house came with Irises. They don't flower for long. All kinds of weeds grow in them but are impossible to get out so they just look messy for most of the year. Was going to replace with crocosmia!

Cannabis.
It didn't go down well with the local constabulary.

piperatthegates planting your forget me nots in a planter won’t contain them, they will seed freely and the parent plants die off.
Its quite easy to recognise the young plants and pull them up where you don’t want them.
I think they’re lovely, but do remove them where they’re not wanted.

@Beebumble2 &@ErrolTheDragon Thank you both for the advice. I will plant some in a tub I think and the rest just in the border and keep an eye on them. I do really like them fortunately.

This made me chuckle 🤣

Tbh crocosmia just as bad for the weed mingling

i’ve just thought of something else: verbascum (great mullein). Huge, hideously ugly, even (or especially) when in flower, and an enthusiastic self seeder. Another unwelcome inheritance from previous owners.

Galium oderatum - I planted it as groundcover in a border but it has gone mad and smothers everything. Also irises - they are multiplying rapidly and just don’t seem to flower long enough to justify the space they take up. Oh - borage as well. The bees love it but I had hundreds of seedlings popping up in my lawn last year.

How come so many people are saying acanthus is a problem? I bought some ‘whitewater’ about 7 years ago and have pampered it ever since. While it is still alive, it’s never got any bigger than the size it was when I bought it.