Toledo Botanical Garden

Getting To Know Your Weeds

By: Jonathan Milbrodt – TBG Horticulturist

Most gardeners have to devote most of their time to weeding, but do not know much these invasive plants they are pulling out. By knowing a little bit about them, may help you better control them, and better appreciate the importance of weeding. Here are 6 very common weeds found in Ohio gardens.

Garlic Mustard is a biennial plant which means it takes 2 full years to complete its life cycle. The first year the plant has round kidney shaped leaves and grows about 4 inches high. The following year it grows 12 to 20 inches. The key eradicating it is to remove it during the first year because it only produces seed during its second year. Once the plant drops seed, the seeds are viable for up to 7 years in the soil, so you will be battling it for some time.

Field Pennycress is a very interesting looking annual plant with flat round seed pods that are each attached separately around a center stem. With these pods, one single plant can hold over 1000 seeds. But it develops a somewhat shallow root system that can usually be completely removed with one pull of the center stem.

Common Chickweed is an annual plant with a low growing branching habit that can produce 2 generations in just 1 growing season. The plant has a shallow fibrous root system, but when pulled by the leaves, the plant usually becomes detached from the roots, and the plant grows back quickly. So it is important to actually dig this plant out of the soil instead of pulling it out.

Yellow Nutsedge is a perennial grass like plant with a 3 sided stem at the base. It spreads mostly by tuber roots in the soil that can be viable for up to 10 years. Usually the tubers are accidentally spread when present in some top soils you add to your garden, or from the potting soil of new plants you install. This proves why it is important to get your soil and plant material from a reliable source.

Canada Thistle is a perennial plant with rhizomes that can spread underground several feet across. So one mature plant will send up several offspring from the same root structure. This is why it is important to remove seedlings right after they germinate in early summer before this plant can establish itself as a perennial every year in your garden.

Dandelion is a perennial plant with the well know yellow flower. The seeds are attached to a pappus that aid the seeds in traveling long distances by wind. Once a seedling is established it develops a deep taproot making it almost impossible to remove the entire plant by pulling. It grows in any soil type but won’t tolerate areas where the soil is tilled or moved around often.

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