Native Plants
Q. Who is Mr. Smarty Plants?
A: There are those who suspect Wildflower Center volunteers are the culpable and capable culprits. Yet, others think staff members play some, albeit small, role. You can torture us with your plant questions, but we will never reveal the Green Guru's secret identity.
Did you know you can access the Native Plant Information Network with your web-enabled smartphone?
Ask Mr. Smarty Plants
Ask Mr. Smarty Plants is a free service provided by the staff and volunteers at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center.
rate this answer
Sunday - September 30, 2007
From: Prescott, AZ
Region: Southwest
Topic: Plant Identification
Title: Plant identifcation and wants to know about weeds
Answered by: Nan Hampton
QUESTION:
My son planted some seeds in pots before he left and I don't know if I am watering weeds/plants??? One plant has green & red (lateral) striped stalks with something on the end that to me from Texas looks likes cacaburrs...(please forgive spelling). I may contact you later for the others but this bothers me now. Also, true/false, a weed is easy to uproot (pulling)? I tugged a little and got nothing.ANSWER:
Mr. Smarty Plants is sorry, but identifying a plant by description alone is almost impossible to do. If you would like to send a photo, though, he will do his very best to tell you what you have. You can find instructions for submitting photos on the Ask Mr. Smarty Plants page in the lower right corner under "Plant Identification".Now, as for weeds, one person's weed may be another person's wildflower. For instance, some people think Cirsium texanum (Texas thistle) is a beautiful wildflower and others consider it a noxious weed. The best definition for a weed that I know is: "A weed is a plant growing somewhere you don't want it to grow." Since weeds can be any sort of plant, they aren't necessarily easy to pull up—it would depend on their size, what kind of roots they have, the type of soil the plant is in and the moisture content of the soil.
More Plant Identification Questions
Pink flower in South Carolina, perhaps poisonous
July 09, 2008 - I saw a beautiful plant while touring Charleston, SC. I do not remember the name - the tour guide talked about a long time ago women giving it to their husband's in tea (maybe?) to kill them. Of co...
view the full question and answer
plant identification, Portulaca pilosa, Kiss-me-quick
October 02, 2007 - There is a small plant with clusters of red-purple flowers and tubular succulent leaves on branching stems I found in the flower boxes at the top of the look-out tower there at the center. I forgot to...
view the full question and answer
Plant identification from Tamaqua PA
August 08, 2010 - I live in PA, have a plant growing in my geranium planter,
was told it was a moonflower, but it is not a vine.
The flower is a white trumpet, six star, with purple in the middle. leaves look like ...
view the full question and answer
Winterberry holly not fruiting
October 22, 2009 - Regarding Ilex verticillata, which I have planted in a partial sun, somewhere between all dry and all wet location, i don't see any red berries, and it's mid-october. We are in the 'burbs of just ...
view the full question and answer
Identification of plant with speckled green leaf
June 21, 2015 - I have a purple (or brown) speckled green leaf plant with tiny yellow daisy-like flowers. The leaf is fuzzy looking on the edge. Self seeds freely in my shady garden.
view the full question and answer
| Support the Wildflower Center by Donating Online or Becoming a Member today. |