Overheard a rant on the bus.What ‘bastard’ things will you not have in your garden.

[florentina1]

A man behind me yesterday was ranting to his friend about “bastard lupins”Apparently his wife loves them, he hate them, and they are coming up everywhere. He was really funny, almost worthy of his own stand up routine.

For me it is fuchsia. Gladioli, hanging baskets and anything with slogans.

The exorbitant sum that garden centres charge for large pots of bamboo is a constant source of astonishment to me. The plant is so invasive and easily propagated you'd think they would pay us to take it away.

@Peridot1 I reckon an agapanthus bed would force out ground elder....

@InAFunk100 - worried I’d just be swapping one problem for another!

I hate petunias too. Ghastly weird sticky leaves. Begonias too. Hate them.

I love lupins though.

aaah horsetails!

My Geologist DH loves them because they are one of the true ancient plants. From the carboniferous period. He has a love for living fossils.

I have tried to grow horsetails in my garden.... on purpose and have failed miserably.

@Peridot1 my Agapanthus has jumped out of its raised bed and is now springing up on my lawn faster than I can get rid of it!!

I love bamboo in pots for the impact, and am very careful with the type I buy. I was looking at some in the garden centre on Sunday and was appalled at rhe prices they were charging and for fully invasive varieties too. They had not one non invasive variety for sale and no label stated it was invasive either.

any one who didn’t know what they were doing would be caught out badly.I’ve previously bought some beautiful specimens on line, 10 plus foot tall to put in huge pots, for the price the garden centre was selling the invasive varieties at half the size and in shit scrawny health.

there are certain plants you should not buy and shove in the ground unless you research it first. Bamboo, Spanish bluebells, wild garlic, giant rhodenderums, golden weeping willow , wisteria etc are all such plants/trees and there are so many more.

I’ll have any bastard plant, just to see if it lives in my garden. Lupine, geraniums, foxgloves, mint, all bastards are welcome as I wish them good luck in surviving and fighting it out with other bastard plants. Because if the birds don’t eat it, the rabbits will, and if they don’t the bastard weather will kill them all 😮‍💨

@Peridot1 Lily of the valley is poisonous to cats and dogs, which is why I keep ripping it out.

Cotoneaster
Ribes
Begonias
That other bloody horrible thing, what's it called. Bergenia. Horrible ugly things all of them.
Bastarding ground elder. My neighbour has a border of them (by accident or design I don't know) and it's fucking impossible to keep them out of my side. I am super lucky that I also have bastard binderweed the other side as I an alongside a little patch of waste ground.
Bastard acanthus mollis. I have a MASSIVE patch of acanthus which is all super structural and impressively lovely but my god it spreads. I have a second and a third patch sprouting up and I don't love it THAT much.
Forget me nots. Monty bangs on every year about the start of summer and how pretty they are blah blah. Nope. I pull them out in handfuls. This year I'm trying to scratch each bloody one out before they flower.
I also have a hideous zombie alstro that WILL NOT DIE. Don't mind them per se, but it's a revolting apricot/yellow colour that goes with nothing in my garden.
Loving the thread but feel slightly embarrassed by my beloved agapanthus, lilies and gladioli (for cut flowers, mostly).
Hate fuchsias though.

My neighbour planted Lilly of the valley on their side and it spread like buggery onto my side, I managed to find it before the dog did.

Totally with you on the running bamboo - it drives me mad that garden centres sell it without any kind of warning. I talked someone out of buying some phyllostachys from B&Q last weekend.

I have bamboo in the ground, but they are very specific fargesia varieties which clump. Easy to stop it spreading as you just take a sharp spade to the edges each year.

@Irisandillies , to be fair, that is a rather pretty begonia!

@JeannieAlogy Dahlias?! 😱. What is wrong with you? Surely you can’t hate the Pom Pom ones…?

What's your secret?
I panted 2 pots of bamboo 18 months ago abs it barely grown.
I've been trying to get it grown so it screens off dh's workshop!

Don't pant at it

On a serious note, If they are recently potted they can take a bit of time to adjust and get going. Is the drainage at the bottom of the pot good? Bamboo doesn't like having wet "feet" and is prone to rot. Conversely it doesn't like drying out either, so you need to water it in hot weather. If it's in pots then you also need to make sure that the roots don't freeze when its cold - it will certainly cause it to sulk (worst case is that it will die).

So, assuming they are draining well and the roots are not frost damaged, try feeding them. Garden manure works well - buy a bag from any garden centre, slap it on the top of the pot and wait for it to work its magic.

Next door's Green Alkanet. I loathe the stuff but it keeps appearing on our side of the fence. And the other side share their uncontained bamboo which has on occasion actually popped up through the floor of our shed.

I'd love to have rampant lupins, agapanthus and cordylines! All lupins are immediately devoured by slugs here, our agapanthus buds get smaller every year, and we lost several cordylines this winter.

Bastarding fucking concrete. What kind of hater concretes their back and front gardens in full? the previous owners of this house that’s who.

And bastarding fucking plastic planters because I can’t afford to deal with the concrete this year

Ive planted loads of nasturtiums tho, love the jolly wee buggers

Do you know what type of bamboo it is? Also are you sure it’s pot is big enough and it’s not root bound and have you fertilised it?

I do actually love nasturtiums… just it’s always a shock when you go out one morning and it’s absolutely coated with black fly 😪there aren’t enough ladybirds in the world to deal with it, I don’t think

Bastard montbretia. I can't get rid of it.

I'm also a yellow hater, disgusting.

I put two fargesia in the ground last year @Irisandillies, I bought it from a specialist seller but even though I've planted it I'm very ambivalent about it. What it it's that awful other stuff and was mislabelled or something?! Waaaah

Fake grass
And
Chrysanthemums
And
Dahlias

I love agapanthus, fuschia, dandelion...

I love hollyhocks but they are stroppy bastards that refuse to grow in my garden. Go down to Kent and the bastards are growing 6ft high in central reservations on dual carriageways though, the smug bastards!

It's funny how one makes connections with plants.

I used to be 'meh' about dahlias but I have a wonderful friend who adores them and she took me through her garden once and how she spoke of them was so enchanting that I now love them.

Thanks for the bamboo advice
It was in 2 pots and we put in the ground 18 months ago.
This made little difference
I do water in hot weather.
And have given it plant feed in summer
Not sure what sort it is.
Was from Morrison