This was mentioned a few years ago, but in my suburban southern California
climate, the absolute worst weed plant in my pots, or in the ground, is
Nothoscordum inodorum. I call it the devil plant because nothing seems to
stop it. First it reproduces both by multiple small black seeds that are
produced by multiple waves of flowers that ripen incredibly quickly. It
flowers off and on during almost any season of the year in this area,
whenever it gets water. It also produces hundreds of tiny brown
rice-grain-sized daughter bulblets, any one of which can eventually produce
another mother bulb with hundreds of its own tiny bulblets. These bulblets
are almost impossible to see in soil if one or more gets left behind. It
grows in any kind of soil. And for some reason, it can go dormant in any
season when it doesn’t receive water. So whether it gets into the pot of a
summer dormant bulb or a winter dormant bulb, it just starts growing again
whenever I start watering that pot. Even tried Roundup on it. It kills the
top leaves, but often does nothing to the mother bulb or makes it go
dormant for a year. If it does kill the mother bulb, it doesn’t seem to
affect the daughter bulblets, so they proceed to grow instead. Apparently
in places where it freezes every winter, they are nicely behaved plants.
But for me, all it takes is one seed or one bulblet getting into one of my
pots to start a whole new infestation. The only solution I’ve found that
works is to discard the entire pot of soil into a garbage bin and remove by
hand the desired bulb or plant that was growing in that pot, carefully
removing all soil in and around the desired bulb or roots of the desired
plant, discarding that soil, too, (to make sure not a single tiny bulblet
grain remains hidden or tucked away somewhere. Then replant the desired
bulb or plant in fresh potting medium. In the ground, I take giant
shovelfuls of soil all around and including the infestation location, and I
literally discard all that soil in the trash. Then I watch that location
like a hawk in case any of the rice-grain bulblets somehow escaped during
the discarding process. Can you tell that I intensely dislike this species.

Shmuel, I think this would be a horrible weed in your climate, too. I’ve
heard that it sometimes shows up in some seed exchanges labelled as some
other species.

--Lee Poulsen
Pasadena, California, USA - USDA Zone 10a
Latitude 34°N, Altitude 1150 ft/350 m

wrote:

collections, I encourage Shmuel to send seeds, but mention in a note that
it self-sows readily. I don't have any Bellevalia self-sowing here, though
I have one in the open garden, but species in its relatives Muscari and
Hyacinthoides are pests in this climate, especially the latter (the dreaded
"Spanish bluebell"). Oncostemma (Scilla) peruviana is invasive in
California but never self-sows here in northern Oregon; it's valuable for
cutting. Some people I know here regard Cyclamen hederifolium as a pest,
but it's fine where I have it, in a spot where almost nothing else will
grow.

evaluate their behavior. I haven't annoyed myself with bulbs I introduced
(yet), but some rock garden perennials have behaved badly (e.g. Scutellaria
spp., Aethionema spp.). The worst invasives in my bulb house are Oxalis
obtusa and Narcissus cantabricus, N. romieuxii, and their hybrids.
Fortunately the Oxalis is not hardy in the open garden here; that's all we
need, another Oxalis weed.

Duh.

to

open

and I

on?

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