LOVELY TO LOOK AT -- BUT--!

Which garden perennial comes to your mind when you hear the word: invasive?  Some will immediately shout out mint; vinca minor comes to mind as does cranesbill.  My Minneapolis family offers up Lily-of-the-Valley.

Invasive perennials generally grow with an underground root that moves through the ground to propagate.  They also reseed easily.  They are usually very hardy--an enticing feature in any marginal growing climate.

They may start out being a solution to a difficult area or a quick fix until you design a permanent landscape plan.

I used all the above rationale when I chose Lathyrus latifolius, perennial sweet peas, to plant on a hillside and vinca minor to plant in a rockery.

Being from the Midwest where the annual sweet pea vines are cherished, I thought I was "queen of the hill" writing to family and friends that I had an entire hillside covered in pink blooms.  The lack of fragrance was also a drawing card for me who suffers from allergies making the blooms a great choice as a cut flower.

Here we are many years later and I shake my head as to how lax I've been keeping the sweet peas under control.

They've become like a giant alien creature wrapping it's tentacles around anything and everything in its path.  Up a tree, encircling a lavender, hugging the spent iris blooms plus making the pathways hazardous to walk along.  If I come up missing, check the sweet pea patch.

I read another gardener's lament.  He wanted them but yet he didn't want them to be so visible.  His solution was to pull the vines from the currant site and replant the seed pods (when they developed and were dried enough to plant) to a fence site on the back of his property.  Good idea if you have the time and energy as the years pass for the fall cleanup and disposal of the spent vines.  The vines will reach a height of 6 to 8 feet on a trellis or chain-link fence.  The tendrils are very sturdy and could be troublesome to clean from a chain-link fence

The perennial sweet pea vines will grow as a ground cover spreading over a large area quickly.  Bees and butterflies are attracted to the blooms.  The deer aren't particularly interested but will browse the vines on their way to a patch of something tastier.

The sweet pea vines love sun or light shade. No special soil or fertilizer needs have to be met  and mine have to rely on the natural moisture as the vines aren't part of the irrigation system.  And yet they thrive.

The vinca minor, also known as periwinkle, is another example of not keeping a plant in check.  It was a great filler for a difficult area of a three tier rockery. After years of neglect it will be next to impossible to dislodge the over, under and in-between roots from the rocks.  The trailing leaves root at the nodes as they move along the ground and quickly spread to form a ground cover.  A great asset for an area of flat ground, but not a rockery

The choice of the vinca was based in part on the fact that it blooms bright blue in early spring.  A joyful sight after winter.

I often think if a landscape is properly taken care of at the right time, a gardener doesn't need a full year membership to a fitness center to keep in shape. Check out the Gardening: Get Good At It - OSU High Desert Garden Tour segment Tuesday July 16 on KPOV 88.9 FM "The Point" between 9-9:30 am.