The Horrible Weed

I was listening to Anne of Green Gables this afternoon while I was crocheting and I heard this from Chapter 9: 

"the only flowers there were myriads of delicate 'June bells,' those shyest and sweetest of woodland blooms."

So, I searched for 'June bells' to see what sort of flowers they may have been.

I don't know if these are the ones Lucy Maud Montgomery was talking about, but I was horrified to see that the first photos I found are of the plant we call 'that horrible weed.'

They are beautiful, tall plants with lavender bells. I was enchanted with them when I saw them at a friend's and asked for a root. That was one of the biggest gardening mistakes we've ever made. They bloom very nicely in their place for a few years and then they explode exponentially and you can't get rid of them.

Normal weed killers don't touch them.The best way to get rid of them is to dig over the bed and take out every piece of root.

One commenter on the website I found said much the same thing.

"Digging is effective if you can dig, but you must carefully sift out every cubic inch of dirt and get EVERY SINGLE ROOT THREAD. i dug out to about 12 inches and got every single turnip and root thread. No regrowth after 4 years."

The have beautiful names:

Creeping Bellflower, Rampion Bellflower, June Bells

Campanula rapunculoides

And beautiful flowers.  

Until you're trying to get rid of them.

We are spraying with glyphosate (round-up), but the little sprouts come laughing up out of the ground as soon as the first leaves die.  We are digging, but a few are sneaking their way up anyway.  Those tubers they are connected to just don't want to give up.

Here are some choice comments from others who have made the unfortunate choice to plant these in their yards.  

"In North America, this is an insidious weed, one whose true nature takes several years to reveal itself.  I would never plant this is any situation, nor would I give it to my worst enemy."

"I bought this plant at a nursery. It was pretty, but it is a monster in disguise."

"This pretty-yet-evil plant sat quietly in my zone 3 garden for about 5 years while secretly organizing an underground army which it released this spring." 

"This is a horrible plant. I have tried and tried to get rid of it.  Goutweed was easy in comparison.  Please do not plant it.  You will regret it."

"No knowledgeable gardener would ever intentionally grow this species, nor pass it along to anyone else."

More information:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/475/