Hello :) If anyone could identify these I'd be very grateful :) 1. Plant A few of these have appeared in our garden recently, grown up to 18-24 inches high. 2. Possible Invasive Weed? Worried this could be an invasive weed. Currently stretches about 8 feet and 12 inches high. Many thanks Jez
#1 really looks like Periwinkles, Vinca minor, to me... Of course, I could be wrong; I'm not really up on British species. #2 is likely poison ivy, Toxicodendron radicans. Compare (or nevermind. Micheal is rarely wrong.)
Thank you Michael and Lorax, I've checked the net for your suggestions and I think ground-elder might be correct :) The blue flower I don't think is periwinkles (we have these elsewhere in our garden) and, from Googling, the images I have come across of alkanet don't seem quite close enough. Many thanks for your help
Ground elder is certainly correct. And alkanet should be correct as well but Michael picked an incorrect scientific name for this plant. Your plant is not Anchusa officinalis. I believe that it is Pentaglottis sempervirens, a plant which is supposed to be naturalized in Britain. See e. g. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/I...sentong_Pentaglottis_sempervirens_closeup.jpg or http://www.bioimages.org.uk/HTML/T1195.HTM.
It looks and resembles an herb but I cant place the name, have you broken the leaves and sniffed at it? I have the Periwinkle and this is definitely NOT IT, my periwinkles have literally taken over my yard and they are highly invasive I ddefinitely want to get rid of them but cant.
Pentaglottis is rather often asked about by people from this region also. Jacobson, WILD PLANTS OF GREATER SEATTLE - SECOND EDITION designates it as "naturalized": "not native here originally, but now present here in a fully wild state (neo-natives). Sometimes a naturalized species grows only in non-original habitats. But if it can compete successfully in undisturbed native plant communities it is fully naturalized"