Dear John,

The Watsonias are crowding out the beautiful native plants along
highway One. I know that you have a fondness for Watsonia, but this
one because it produces all those cormlets in the stalk and seed and
expands below as well is a menace. The cormlets get projected out a
way and soon the area expands dramatically so all you see for quite
a distance is Watsonia and much of the year dead Watsonia leaves
which aren't attractive at all. No one comes along the road to cut
back those leaves and destroy the corms so every year they expand.
And to my mind the flower on this species is not dramatic for very
long. It is rare that I have seen it looking very attractive when I
have passed it on the highway. There are some Watsonias that have
also naturalized along our coast that are really very pretty for
several weeks in the spring. Their clumps expand where they have
been planted, but you don't see the area around them in every
direction become solid Watsonias.

I wish there was a way that nurseries were prohibited from selling
this species to anyone in California and hope Lee will never plant
his out. When I explained the problem to Jim Duggan he took this
species out of his catalog and I appreciate Lauw doing this as well.
If we know that a plant can be a problem in one temperate
Mediterranean climate it seems important to do what we can to
prevent it becoming a problem in any others.

Mary Sue

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