Mirabilis Jalapa

Help! This plant is driving me 'Nutz', I keep pulling little spreading plants, and they keep coming back.
How can I get rid of them?

Good old Four-O'clocks. I've heard them referred to as the fatally fragrant flower. That's a tuberous plant and in your neck of the woods I suppose the problem is that the frost kills off the upper portions of the plant but leaves the roots to come back and grace you with their presence the following year. Not to mention it re-seeds rampantly in many regions. Have you tried hitting the new growth in spring with regular strength RoundUp? You could slip on a cloth glove and dip your hand in the RU and grab the plant by the base and slide your hand upwards brushing the leaves? If you did try RU already and it didn't work, were you using a concentrated formula or maybe applying it when it was too hot or too cold outside?

If you get a chance, maybe you could share your experiences with this plant and how you ultimately were able to get it under control here-
http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/92

Remind--the cloth glove OVER a plastic one, you don't want that right on your skin

I will try this, Thank you

Digging is the only answer I have found that works - pretty but not worth the space it uses up.

Well here it is February, and I`m still pulling up them little greenies. I never got around to buying some roundup.
I`m just wondering how invasive they`ll get come spring. 'UGH!!

It's nice, here they die in the winter... though i do have one HUGE tubular that survives the freeze... and it's so close to one of my rose bushes - I can't dig it up.

Last year it got so out of control it completely smothered 3 of my rose bushes... i just kept hacking all the branches off - it looked anemic but at least my roses got some sun.

I think in CA they can be quite evasive, with the dropping of seeds (thousands per plant, it seems) they just shoot up everywhere.

good luck.

Hey sowmo, I feel for you.

One nice thing about living where I live is that the ickies generally green up long before the desirables do so I can generally spot them and nuke them with little or no risk to the surrounding plants that are still dormant.

I just bought some seeds of this plant, not knowing it's invasive nature. Think it would do well in a container? Tamara

Tamara.... they get HUGE. How big is your container... and up here in zone 5, it isnt as bad as in warmer climates.
Invasive being -- larger plants could and will produce hundreds of seeds.... so they will reseed themselves.

here is an image of one of mine:

zonegirl5, If this is your first time planting this, I would use a container, so that you can judge for yourself, it is a beautiful plant but very invasive here, you can trim it down in containers.

Good luck

Zonegirl5, I would stay as far away from them as possible. At a previous house, we had empty lots across the street from us. After about 15 yrs of being in the house, I noticed these white flowers blooming over there, walked over and took a look. Morning glory. The next year I had them in our back yard. I battled them every year after that, we eventually sold, went back to visit a neighbor and looked into what was our backyard. I was shocked and heartbroken to see those vines everywhere. And I mean everywhere. They were growing up and smothering a crabapple and the viburnum next to it, then over about 10 ft and onto another viburnum and up into another crabapple. They completely choked out 2 clematis that were growing on the fence. They were crawling along the mulch and covering any plant in their way. There's no way I would have one in a container. I read your other post about the invasives in your neighbors yard, why give yourself more headache?

terryr,

could it be that version of MG was the wild morning glory

now THAT is invasive. grows like wildfire and very hard to get rid of.... chokes everything out. I had it at our first home... it could be a ground creeper, or climber -- it was everywhere, and even Round-Up wouldn't get rid of it... it always came back.

and Tamara -- if the 4-O'clocks get too big, just break off some branches.
I had one last year that was smothering 3 of my rose bushes, and i'd just break off the lower branches.
PLUS -- when the plant gets really big (and heavy) and good strong wind will bring it down some -- so you will be braking off the bigger branches anyways.

they really are a neat plant to have -- and they have a very sweet scent -- my DH loves them (more than i do)

and when they reseed the following year - the seedlings are easy to pluck out of the ground.... so if you keep that under control - they are not as invasive.

btw -- what color did you get?

oh yes - and stay on top of it you must.

DH has a glass bowl at our front door. On days he's home, he goes out and fills his pockets with seeds and deposits them in the bowl.

I used to do that -- but after the first year, it got really old really fast.
My neighbor, who i originally got the seeds from -- had them at their old house. She's plant them to where they's over hang a sidewalk, and she could just sweep the seeds up, where i have to pick them out of my wood chips.

As far as I know, no it wasn't the wild morning glory, it came from the farm on the other side of the field, behind those empty lots. I found later that they had an arbor with morning glory growing up it.

Hi I really like this plant it´s quite exotic for me in Sweden. And the roots not survive our winter so I have to overvinter in a pot inside my house.

This winter I bought seeds on a site like Ebay, but in Sweden, to spotted flowers of Four-O'clocks-plant. No one of the seeds have sprout. :o(

So If anyone have Spotted flower and seeds, and would like a trade, I have a couple of different seed in exchanges, please Dmail me, and I can send you my seedlist.
Sylvia

I saw one of these at someone's house a few years ago and begged a start. I kept it potted because he said it can spread wildly. Well, mine has never gotten very large, maybe 2' tall tops in a container and then I planted it in the ground. Last year it almost wasn't, this year it is already showing signs of returning so I'm hoping for some blooms for once. I have an acre of yarden so invasiveness isn't that big a deal to me.

What is a problem is a problem is when something like the passion vine that a dear friend gave me several times before it finally decided to survive here moves itself by way of long winding roots and then dies when I try to move it back where I really want it. Very frustrating.

I love my 4 oclocks they are the only thing that looks good in august and still blooming. But I have to dig the roots with a shovel to clear out the ones I don't want, and constantly pulling up babies on a daily basis as long as I see them popping up. Can you imagine what it would look like if we didn't do this? LOL

I have always been under the impression that 4 o'clocks are small ground hugging plants not shrubs. I really didn't think the man who gave me my shrub had the correct name for it. What an eye opener this thread has been. I have no unwanted sprouts to deal with yet. Just pray each spring that I will continue to see signs of new life and wish it would bloom for me again like it did in that man's yard.

Mine get about 4 foot tall , That's shrub enough for me LOL

Kathy, you need some Boltonia. It blooms until a freeze hits it hard. It's a perennial.

There is actually a good side to four o'clocks - Japanese beetles love them and they are poisonous to the beetles.

I have hear that about black nightshade, but not 4 o'clocks. Thanks for the information. I always let some black nightshade grow around here just for that purpose. Blister beetles also swarm to it.

what's that leaflady? Boltonia not heard of it.

I think it is a wild flower. I don't know the botanical name. It is the last plant to be blooming here in central MO other than mums. It can be aggressive. Maybe even invasive if you let it. I'll try to remember to ask at PG.

Google for Boltonia Asteroides.

I have grown 4:00 from seeds for the last 2 summers. This year I have THOUSANDS of volunteers. I pull them daily, and also remove with a stirrup hoe. Never again for me!

Karen

Are we all talking about the same plant? I have been growing mirabilis jalapa for at least 8 years, in the ground. I get the seed from Fragrant Path, for the most part, because they have white and pink. If I put in 50 seeds perhaps 10 or 12 come back, and grow slowly. I must have put in 200-300 seeds over the past few years. I get a plant that's about two feet tall, it drops seeds, many of which I do not bother to collect, and about this time of year - now - I put more down.

I pull up the spent, seedless plants, and get a few tubers that are very easy to remove from the ground. Perhaps it is my practice of pulling them up each year to plant bulbs. None of my neighbors have any, and as I said above, I have trouble keeping them around. Now, in warmer zones I understand it's different, and I certainly would approach them with caution in Florida or California. In most sections of my yard they establish slowly and die out.

Donna

Here in OK they can take on a life of their own. I do love them though. Once I figured out what the previous owner had left me with, I dug them up and moved them to an area that is bordered on all sides with concrete. Now I can enjoy them with a lot less hassle. There are still some babies sprouting in the original areas but they are easy to yank up if I grab them before they more than a few inches tall.