May Apples in the home landscape

Maybe this is a goofy question, I don't know. With permission, I rescued a may apple at a state owned place. I was going to take it out to my dads woods, but then I discovered with all the clearing (of invasives) we've done, he has them. I have it planted temporarily in my front bed, thinking I would keep it now. Will it take over? Is this something that I don't want in town on my little lot? Better out at my dads in the woods?

Thanks,
Terry

In my opinion it would be better in your dad's woods. they go dormant in summer and they do spread...but transplanted ones may not be as agressive as where they just grow naturally.

Terry I have them growing naturally here and they are not aggressive at all. I know that all plants behave differently in different locations, growing condtions etc. I can tell you that they like it moist and love the leafy type soill of the woods over the drier "exposed" soil in other locations on my property. They are lovely when the deer don't eat all the leaves off and leave me with just stems sticking up!

I would be cautious in a garden. I accidentally brought some with some other plants that I rescued and they are bullying the other plants right out of existence. They have such a solid, shallow web of root that the other plants can't come up through it. Perhaps if you have a dry shady spot where nothing else grows it would do well.

I'd rather have them than not. Mine are spreading slowly, but they are easy enough to get rid of when you don't want them anymore.

I can't believe Deer have eaten them...they have never even touched mine in any way and I have hundreds.

Oh the deer love them, most years I never even get to see them bloom! I think this year I have seen four or five blooms lol!! One year they ate everyone in the yard and woods, it looked like Mortica's garden out there!

That's interesting in that alot of their parts are poisonous.

They eat the leaves only, leaving behind the stems. But the deer here eat or at least taste just about everything! Of course the stuff that I WISH they would eat they leave alone, poision ivy, poision oak, this viney thing that is everywhere, the periwinkle that keeps finding its way into my gardens via my neighbor!

Here yall go! A picture of my decapitated May Apples lol! Sad isn't it!

I planted some from the woods next to my house in a shaded area that gets afternoon sun. They are threatening to take over, so I am gonna dig some up & send them to my cousin in Va.

Today, we went to the Rutger gardens in New Brunswick, NJ. Check those clumps of mayapple there. They are huge. First I didn't know what they were. Then I realize they are BIG mayapples.

ldy_gardenermd- Really sorry about your decapitated May Apples. I've had that happen before. One of my favorite sayings is never underestimate hungry critters.

There doesn't appear to be any scientific evidence out there indicating that May Apples (Podophyllum peltatum) are invasive in their native range and to the contrary they are actually listed as threatened and endangered in a few areas. Now granted, they can be aggressive in some ideal situations but not invasive. They are a spring ephemeral and what's really neat about them is that other species can be planted in and amongst them to grow up through them when they start the natural process of dying back. I've got two 6-packs of Big Leaf Aster (Aster macrophyllus) that I'm going to attempt to introduce to two areas on my property where May Apples are growing. One area, photographed below, was found after I started clearing Buckthorn.

That area above is doing much better now that I've removed some ickies from it. Here's an area where I planted 10 plants before we moved in to this home about 5 years ago. The area was over run with Japanese Honeysuckle so I don't have many more than the original plants but they are still alive which is a good sign-

I think Mayapples make a nice ground cover for a shady spot or woodland spot. They get along well with other wood land plants. But they do spread, and can easily be controlled by pulling strays.

I've pretty much decided to go ahead and keep my lonely mayapple. My dad, I think, has plenty out there. If they get to be too much, I'll just take them out and replant them out at my dad's at that time. Or see if I can keep them in bounds. I'm going for somewhat of a wild area (my whole lot), so I'm not too concerned at this point. I might be signing a different tune in a few years, but for now, it'll stay.

Yes, I agree. They do make a nice ground cover for a woodland area. for a few months of the year. I just wish they'd take off a little bit better.

LOL!! I do that all the time. My daughter is hearing impaired.....or to be PC I should say she's hard of hearing. She went for 3 years to a school for the hearing impaired (against our wishes, but it's a long story). The first 5 yrs she spent at a school for the physically disabled.

Yep, I got a lone Mayapple. I actually thought it would just go dormant since I dug it up. But with this cold damp weather, it's still out there. Hasn't grown any, but it's still out there.

Well well well, then we need a soul mate for that lone May Apple of yours.

This cold damp weather is the pits. I think it's supposed to rain tonight. We sure do need the rain so I am grateful.

It is the pits. Who knew driving down south would be so cold on Sat. I couldn't believe I needed my winter coat! We had 3 quick downpours this afternoon. I don't know if it'll do any more tonight or not. Last I saw, they said rain till Wed. And I've got a 2 plants to go in here and a bunch to put out at my parents. We're going to need 2 weeks just to dry out enough.

And thank you for giving my mayapple a soul-mate. No wonder he hasn't grown...lol....

I gotta go look at the weather report. I didn't think it was supposed to rain through Wednesday. We really do need this rain real bad. It will help bring the water table up a little bit. So many people in our neighborhood had to have their wells redrilled last year from this drought that it was a shame.

I just checked weather bug. They've got us in rain till Thurs now. Didn't they have their wells deep enough? That was an expense I'm sure they weren't expecting.

We were one of the families that lost our well last year too. Our well was originally at around 400'. To add insult to injury, I fried the pump because I was desperately trying to water plants and didn't know the well had run dry so I burned it out. You have to understand that last year was the worst drought on record for 100 years I think and that was followed by two subsequent years of drought. Many people had to redrill the year before. Those with deeper wells made it through that first year but many didn't make it through the second year. There are a few families in this neighborhood that didn't have to redrill. I suppose it depends on the aquifer. I don't know that much about wells but most of these wells around here are newer because the neighborhood is newer and most of them were at what was deemed decent depths, they just weren't deep enough to withstand this drought.

You are correct, this was an expense we could have lived with out. The pump alone was around 2k.

I don't know much about wells either. My parents and my in-laws all have them. I know my husband said when he was a kid, the pigs would hit something and water would flow and run the well dry. Who knows how old the in-laws well is, but my parents is about 10 yrs. I'm sorry you had to replace your well. Think of all the plants you could have bought with that extra 2k! Dang!

Ummm, the actual re-drilling of the well to include all the permits and such was right around 9k and that was a good price and only because we had used that guy before. I had other quotes that were well in excess of that and my heart was doing flip flops. Not much you can do when your well goes dry other than to redrill deeper and hope for the best in that you hit a good aquifer. The pump was around 2k by itself. Depressing. Very depressing. Needless to say that although I was a proponent of water conservation before, I am now a diehard proponent of water conservation and a weeping willow was removed here because of that well running dry and I'm going to remove two more. There are a few neighbors removing theirs too. There are plants that are absolute water hogs and Weeping Willow would be one of them.