Late last week, we caught wind of a native plant sale to raise money for a nature center up in Loveland. We don't have a whole lot of money to go nuts on bedding plants this year, but native plants in our landscape would do more good in the long run, so we went to check it out. We found an Oregon grape to go in the aspen grove (we started with one, and let it expand on its own -- free trees!) and a couple of drought tolerant flowers.
While speaking with some of the master gardeners at a booth set up around the plant sale, we finally got an answer about the invasive weed we have been fighting in our front yard. I sort of remembered hearing second hand about a county extension office person seeing the leaf and offering fatalistic sympathy. That person called it campanula, but that was an awfully broad family to google, and I could only remember the name half the time and almost never when I was doing my research. The person today helped me to the common name: creeping bellflower. Back to the google, and I found hits like "My dad told me it was invasive but I didn't listen and now I'm crying," and "Threat level: Invasive -- ERADICATE!" There's an interactive map that shows three verified "infestations" of it in Boulder County. I wonder whether I should report my own lawn to see whether anyone from the government volunteers to help eliminate it. We haven't been able to accomplish it on our own. Advice today was to keep it from going to seed all warm season, and then in the fall put Roundup on it. I'm actually considering it (and I despise Roundup with every cell in my body).
I didn't get to dress up and decorate the house with roses, or make a bunch of fancy foods for today's Kentucky Derby. We had too much going on (acquiring weed barrier and replacement 35 cent goldfish after three of the six in the pond died) to put much effort into the race. I started watching it 45 minutes before post time. When I told the Man that they downgraded the track from fast to sloppy, he got grumpy and predicted horses would be injured and destroyed for the mud, and refused to watch. I understood his aversion, but I watched anyway. I selected Tacitus for my favorite and Plus Que Parfait as my long shot to show. After the Mr's glum warning, I was on edge watching the race. When Maximum Security did his lane shift that interfered with other horses, the move that got him disqualified, I didn't quite understand what I was seeing, but I definitely saw it live and held my breath, afraid that there was a chain-reaction tumble about to start. I didn't want to see the race end in controversy, but there it was. Out of my hands. I never put any real money on it, but my pick Tacitus ended up third after the DQ, and Plus Que Parfait was better than half, at eighth.
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