Something scary
Sunday 25 October 2009 - Filed under Plants
In honor of the approaching holiday, may I submit this as the scariest thing I’ve seen in a while? Pretty, though. If it doesn’t take over the city, I like the looks of it here as a single specimen planting. I grow it, but only in a pot with no drainage hole for it to make an escape. Or is there a non-invasive equisetum I don’t know about?
2009-10-25 » megan
25 October 2009 @ 11:54 pm
I absolutely adore Equisetum but it’s adventurous nature is quite off putting. I grow E. scirpoides in my pond and it is constantly on the move.
This planting looks fantastic and works in the space it’s in.
Ryan
26 October 2009 @ 6:09 am
It turns out that the secret to Equisetum is *where* you plant it. Based on experience, I’d say Tennessee is a good bet.
My grandmother put in a few stalks around the foundation of her house back in the 1940’s, and it always fascinated me as a kid. Looks a little like something a dinosaur would graze on, doesn’t it? I was back east this summer, and my mother and I visited the old family home (thankfully, it was up for sale, so we could wander around with impunity), and lo and behold, there it was – looking a little thinner and more scraggly, but still very much alive. And very contained! It hadn’t expanded its territory at all in all those years.
Mom was talking a mean game on the way over about how she wanted to cut some and try planting it at her place, but once we were there she chickened out. Then again, this is the woman who eyes our massive thickets of blackberries and says “I wish I could get those to grow like that.”
I’m all, “um, mom… no you don’t.”
26 October 2009 @ 11:14 am
When I moved mine into the new oval stock-tank “bog” about a month ago I wondered about the drain-hole and that whole escaping thing. But then I promptly forgot about it. Thanks for the reminder….I think.
26 October 2009 @ 11:16 am
So is that an intentional planting, or do you think it just “grew”?
I like the look and it doesn’t seem to have anyplace to escape to, so I’d think it will be just fine. Untl they want something different.
26 October 2009 @ 11:29 am
Hi Megan~~ It is a scary plant. What is it, besides its invasive nature? Maybe it’s that before it leafs out it looks like a armadillo’s tail or something equally creepy and threatening. There is a bunch of it growing in a ditch near here and I keep thinking about digging a clump for a water bowl–like you, the ONLY way I would ever consider growing it. Dancing Oaks has an Equisetum lookalike in their huge water containers and for the life of me I can’t recall the name of it. It’s a different genus altogether but really tall and lacy and tropical looking and hardy here. I’ll let you know when I remember it. Your pictured design is, well, interesting. I don’t hate it but I’m not completely swooning either…
28 October 2009 @ 10:46 am
Wow, I agree, scary as all get-out, especially with the crows on the steps. You know my feelings on horsetail! Shudder. If I lived near that planting and it somehow colonized my garden or an open space, I would be on the warpath with whoever designed/planted it.
28 October 2009 @ 10:48 am
PS Oh wait, now that I look again I see that those blobs on the steps are not crows. They suggested them somehow in my brain, maybe influenced by the black bird in your header!
28 October 2009 @ 2:00 pm
Hi Megan, very scary indeed. This plant is the worst invasive ever. I do like the stone and brick on the building however.
Frances
29 October 2009 @ 4:24 pm
Very invasive under right conditions