I Hate Weeds

My house backs up to a drainage ditch. There is always water in it and there are fish and birds and turtles, so it's kind of like having a creek behind the house. The easement is maintained by the County, which is nice, because that means I don't have to mow outside my fence! And, on occasion, they spray some incredibly nasty herbicide that kills everything. I heart that herbicide.

The last time they sprayed was back in April. I called City Hall who referred me to the County, who sent me straight to voice mail. Nobody ever did tell me just exactly what it was that killed the most annoying weed known to mankind: the Campsis radicans , also known as the Trumpet Creeper Vine. Remember how there was that scene in the Lion King where that animal shivered at the mere mention of Mustafa's name? Yeah. That's me and this god-awful Trumpet Creeper. *shivers*

I've tried just about everything I can think of to kill this shit short of dousing it with diesel and striking a match. Even then, I've been told that the roots and runners that are still under the soil will eventually become fertilized by the degrading diesel residue and will actually grow faster! I just can't win.

The vines grow up over my fence. The stems are often split by the fence. They are slightly protected by the fenceboards, I guess, so it's harder to eradicate them right there. I guess if you mow often enough, it can keep it at bay. If you stop mowing, they'll pop up all over the damned place. They send out runners that pop up all over the lawn. They have little seeds with little papery-wing things (kinda like seeds in a pinecone) that fall out of the pod and fly their way to a new location. They particularly like to land next to the slab foundation of my house and creep their way up my brick, attaching their little brown viney feet to my mortar, which I know isn't good for it. Even the clippings will root if you don't pick them up after you chop them off.

The garden we built at the beginning of spring is a raised planter. It's 3 feet high off ground level. Those fucking vines grew up through 3 feet of soil to pop up in our garden, even after cutting down the sod to the topsoil, laying down weed cloth, and leaving plastic garbage bags over it for a week before building. Zombie plants...that's what they are. The Undead.

My personal favorite thing comes from Texas A&M's research facility and they put this warning on the actual document that the USDA and NRCS has on file for this plant: "Warning: Contact with the leaves and flowers of trumpet creeper results in skin redness and swelling among mammals. It is also slightly toxic if ingested." Great! Well, let's just plant them all over the muhh-fukkin place, then, shall we?!

It doesn't help that the vine is invading my neighbor's yard via her fence as well and she's not doing a thing to stop it. I look at this vine kinda like fleas: If your neighbor has 'em, you will too, and it's a pain in the ass to keep them from crossing over into your yard without being extremely diligent about poisoning, which is kinda bad for every other living thing.

I've tried RoundUp, I've tried Remedy. I've tried every over-the-shelf product available to me legally at any kind of garden center, home store, hardware store, or pesticide provider. I've even used some very old chemicals I found in my grandparents' storage shed that, I'm sure, the EPA banned decades ago. There was a hole in my rubber glove and the pump sprayer was dripping at the squeeze trigger and some of the chemical dripped into the glove. My entire body - especially my head - tingled for awhile, but the tingling lingered (heh) for a week in my arm. Who knows what kind of genetic damage I did myself. If it had worked, it would have been worth it. But it didn't.

Anyway, the County came by and sprayed and managed to stave off this Illegal Alien of the Foliage World and I was elated. I thought maybe, just maybe, they had put it to death for good. We had a huge drought over the summer and the frequent mowing kept the vines from showing themselves for awhile.

Two weeks ago, we began getting rain. Then it rained for several days straight, and blessed me with a tornado that hit my house. It keeps raining off and on and then, sure enough, I see green popping up over the top of my fence.

Dammit. They're back.

This Leafy Devil is sometimes sold as an ornamental plant but, beyond that, has absolutely no intrinsic value whatsoever. There is no evidence of it spreading from other parts of the neighborhood, so someone had to have planted it; either my neighbor's previous owner, or one of my house's previous owners (which i wouldn't doubt at all, because all of the last 3 were total fucking idiots). You know what's so incredibly ironic, too? My mother bought one of these 10 years ago. Killed it. Bought another one a few years later. Killed it. Bought another one right before I got this house. Killed it. She can't get it to grow at ALL at her house, and she lives less than a mile from me! With the same crappy soil! But for some reason, I can't stand it, and I have more than I know what to do with. I've asked her to come take all of it, to remove it and replant it in her yard, but she's yet to take me up on it. I think my experience with this plant has scared the bejeezus out of her from ever wanting to grow it herself.

Anybody ever seen "Little Shop of Horrors?" Yeah. That's what I'm living. Feeeeeed me, Stillllliiiiieeee! I wondered why we never saw any stray cats around here...

I have contacted my local County Extension office, but they never responded to any of my emails. Even THEY don't know what to do about this shit, I'm sure. I'm about ready to contact Texas A&M directly, or the NRCS or USDA and beg them for help in eliminating this invasive species.

Now that I have my mortgage crisis taken care of (oh, that's a long story), there's no reason why I can't start putting some money into my yard. But I refuse to do it if I'm just going to have this horrible, terrible plant covering and choking out every single native plant I try to grow.

Grr! Now, I have work to do for work (i am SO tired of working all day and coming home and working some more), and then I have a ton of paperwork to do for Wells Fargo so they can now officially own my ass.

Love to all,