Are these weeds in my wildflower garden?
Hey everyone. Got a wildflower meadow going but I have a couple different species growing there, should I pull them out? One has flowers about to emerge, everyone says they're weeds, the other one in question is the plant with the long green things shooting up. What are they? Kill or keep?
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applestar
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Wildflowers are great way to attract pollinators and beneficial insects, and support them so they can have safe source of food. 
OK, so the second one with green things shooting up is definitely a weed as in you don’t want that — that is RAGWEED — a chenopod commonly attributed as source of hayfever allergies.
That first one though, I’m pretty sure is HAWKWEED. While name implies weed, I usually let that one stay where they are not bothersome since they have blossoms like tiny dandelions and is attractive to butterflies, and rabbits will readily munch them down quite happily (in other words most of them in unprotected space (I.e. not garden beds) don’t get to stay standing very long.
…one of my favorite garden observations was watching a fat mama rabbit slowly and thoughtfully biting and cutting down one of those tall harkweed flower stalks at the basal rosette of leaves, then proceeding to munch and eat the entire long stalk — disappearing into her mouth like spaghetti — as I watched, until only the top floral cluster was sticking out of her mouth, … getting startled by some noise, dashing off with the cluster still in front of her face….
OK, so the second one with green things shooting up is definitely a weed as in you don’t want that — that is RAGWEED — a chenopod commonly attributed as source of hayfever allergies.
That first one though, I’m pretty sure is HAWKWEED. While name implies weed, I usually let that one stay where they are not bothersome since they have blossoms like tiny dandelions and is attractive to butterflies, and rabbits will readily munch them down quite happily (in other words most of them in unprotected space (I.e. not garden beds) don’t get to stay standing very long.
…one of my favorite garden observations was watching a fat mama rabbit slowly and thoughtfully biting and cutting down one of those tall harkweed flower stalks at the basal rosette of leaves, then proceeding to munch and eat the entire long stalk — disappearing into her mouth like spaghetti — as I watched, until only the top floral cluster was sticking out of her mouth, … getting startled by some noise, dashing off with the cluster still in front of her face….
Thanks for the info. I ripped them all out today. Even if this is hawkweed and it's attractive to fauna, it's definitely NOT attractive to me in my meadow. Some of the stalks I pulled out today were like 7 ft tall and were towering over my daisies and coneflowers. It was stunning how quickly they took over, and equally stunning how nice everything looks now that they're gone.
That’s ultimately the very definition of “weeds” = plants that are not wanted where they are growing.