Nasty

We got a letter in the post from the council this week.  The weed inspector had visited our property and found us in wanting.  There were patches of uncontrolled noxious weeds  -- blackberry, cineria, sweet briar and bridal creeper.

For a while I felt miffed, couldn't they see all the hard work we have put into beating down the huge thickets of blackberry ... crikey the little bits that are left are just a fraction of keeping the big patches under control.  As for the sweet briar I knew it had to go ... but I liked its flowers and didn't understand it was a formal noxious weed.

Now for the cineria, after a web search I found it was the yellow dandelion type plant I was mulling over whether it was a weed or not -- I hadn't managed to identify it to know. I was leaning towards it being a weed, but again had no idea it was a BAD weed.

As for bridal creeper, again I had to search the web to see what I would be looking for.  Armed with this information and the map provided by the council, yep there is a clump of the stuff growing through a wood heap (photo above).  I began to feel grateful to the council.  This one is apparently a real horror once it gets a go on.  At the moment we have just one plant, so hopefully it won't be too hard to eradicate.  It is in flower (bad) so time is of the essence.  It has brown spots on its leaves (good) which is a type of rust fungus that is being used in an attempt at biological control but I am not taking any chances ... it will be getting a dose of poison next time I'm out there, now is the right time of year to do it.

Oh yes, the council is coming back in April to check up on us again.  Hopefully to give us the all clear.