Oh yes.. :) Most here have heard my stories...I planted them years ago..and I can not rid myself of them....thousands of new seedlings sprout everywhere every single year. I pull them by handfuls and handfulls each week. I despise them. My dad was a farmer and told me I would be sorry for planting them someday...(farmers hate them, they mess up equipment and cost $$ to repair)...I laughed at him and told him I could "control them"....well he has been dead 8 years now..but I am sure he is laughing his fool head off everytime I grumble. I often find myself speaking outloud to him as I pull them out handfulls at a time. "Yes dad, You were right, I hate this *#%^$)@ things too". Each year I pull them faithfully for awhile and because it is a never ending job clear till frost I give up eventually and tire of it...All it takes is ONE seedling to survive and even if only blooms a few flowers, it seeds. .......and seeds....and seedss...and seeds... :(. Roundup doesn't bother them....preen doesn't effect them....nothing but pulling them. And they sprout daily...worse than any weed you ever had. And even worse..they appear the next year in other places than you had them orginally.....so a new battle ensues.....

I feel for you...but it will only get worse...if you can bear it..pull the vines out now...before they seed...

I love how they look....nothing beats going out in the morning and see that mass or blue or purple......but..the headaches afterwards for years are just not worth the beauty in my eyes. Others here love them and will disagree...this is just my story and I am sticking to it :)

When you see morning glories..run don't walk :)

I planted 4.......... and it ate my lamp post, and made
a little fence on the ground!
{{gwi:748032}}

Haziemoon

NOW you tell me! I'm pulling them up now, roots and all. Our courtyard garden is only 12 feet wide by 18 feet long. Please tell me that in four or five years it won't be wall-to-wall vines!!! Anyhow, thanks for the response. ;>(

can't tell you that... :) If your vines seed anything like mine...you will live to regret the day...hurry hurry pull them out!!!!!!!

Would you be interested in a wisteria? :)
Another vine mistake :)

My husband says it will come in during the night one evening while we sleep under the doors and through cracks in the windows and wrap

2007 Horror Movie of the Year. "Wisteria on Bates Street

someone in Ormewood park on Woodland Ave has GORGEOUS grandpa otts MG vines. THey planted them without trellises and trained them up and down the sides of their wide front steps. This looks just incredible!

GGG

Well...are they gone yet? :)

Wait, wait..I already see one sprouting :) Nah..you will be ok for this year..it is next year you will be rewarded for your spoils.. ;)

I pulled some this afternoon AGAIN and thought of you..

Tell me, you guys....if you planted MG in a pot to contain the roots, etc., will the vines themselves root if they spill over onto the ground?

Haziemoon - I for one think your MGs are gorgeous!! Don't you have a large property that can handle them? I planted 3 last year that covered the ugly chainlink fence. Not one seeded, which was a disappointment.

Carol

~~sigh~~ I have a love-hate relationship with them. They are native here and grown wild. I yank them out all the time but at the same time I seeded Heavenly Blue and with do some of the Japanese ones next spring. I figure if I am going to have them anyway I want colors I like. This is my arbor from early August - the Heavenly Blue is all the way down the right hand side of the arbor now. The purples ones are native and I didn't plant them. Looks so beautiful every morning. It is just a joy to sit out there and have coffee and that view......

Lynne

Ladies, I thank all of you for your sympathy. Keesha, you make this 'tragedy' sound so humorous - but apparently I won't find it funny next year! Who was it who said the road to hell is paved with good intentions?

UGH_ i am regeretting this already too!
I planted it all along my veggie garden fence.. Why do we picture them stayign on the fence and not in our veggie beds? Last year it was nice. This year it is eating the fence- all the flowers outide the fence and the tomatoes. they are popping up IN the veggie beds. not good. soon I will have to tear them out.. sad though because they are very pretty..

good luck with your take over! :)

When morning glories win the battle you have to make a comedy out of it or you will lose your mind...

From personal experience, I think the heavenly blue variety does not reseed with the vengence that the others do....at least if it did reseed, it was managable with a bit of maintaince. The smaller varieties are the worst offenders..especially the dark purple. Your earth might also effect it..how easy the ground is for seeds to sprout. The year AFTER you plant them is the real problem..not the same year usually.

Lorinscott, it is not the roots the are the problem..it is the seeds. They flower so profusely there are tons of seeds....and they hide under the vines so they flower often and you don't see them ever...deadheading is just not possible....they flower with new flowers daily and are special at hiding...

Like I said, I love them too..for beauty...but I hate the after effects. I will never again plant them. I will enjoy them as I drive by others homes.

These may make you rethink MGs. This one is called chocolate something. Only 2 reseeded from last year.

{{gwi:748033}}

That looks just like my "Rose Silk". First year I've grown this vine, I love the color! I notice it doesn't have nearly as many seed pods as "Star of Yelta".

Diane

Gorgeous!

They are so fast growing and so pretty!
I just love your arbors and trellis'.
I wish I'd thought of putting them on mine this year.
The ones covering the ground right now, would sure be
beautiful on my arbor!

Haziemoon

Continuing the saga ... pulled out climbers in front of two of the trellises and left the third to show that while the leaves are big and beautiful, never got many flowers. Have now pulled them all out, going after every darn root today. But that still leaves me with a practical solution to masking that big, beige background.

Planting options are quite limited: drainage piping runs about a foot beneath my beds, pea gravel covers the rest of the planting area, which is only 8 feet wide by 16 feet long. (This is a small courtyard patio with a modest planting area that's typical of many of the little retirement cottage communities being built all over the country.)

Any suggestions would be appreciated!

Here is a link that might be useful:

clematis?

I freely use roundup on anything I want to get rid of, but have to be careful with overspray. Heavenly Blue does not form seed for me. Even'Grandpa Ott'did not return. Maybe the soil is to acid or poor here. My little blue one, species hirsuta, I think, is probably an obnoxious weed and may soon be a regret. I will have to wipe roundup on any of the leaves I can reach,if it starts to romp. Sold to me by a prestigious English seedhouse.

Keesha, I love clematis. Thank you for the suggestion. I presume it's non-invasive?

Would the morning glories vines I may have missed this year, start showing before I planted new clematis vines - or is this wishful thinking?

Just a note to mention the Morning Glory BUSH. This bush grows tall with beautiful morning glory flowers; then the weight of the flower buds at the top makes each stalk bend and lay along the ground. Now we have a major problem which DH solved by chopping each stalk back to 18 inches long. That's probably not the solution I would have chosen...maybe a tomato cage or something. Maybe I could have put them in their own little (10 ft) circle. They were beautiful every morning and humming birds loved them. Nothing special after about 2:00 p.m.

I'll add my own picture to all the pretty pictures of MG's, but my story is similar to Keesha's. I have been trying to erradicate them for several years. I do pretty well in the spring, but get busy and then behind my back they grow 8'and are hard to pull because they are wrapped around all the other plants. Maybe next year...
{{gwi:176042}}

I don't know why, but I can't get morning glories to grow to save my life. I loved them when I was a kid-- my mom and grandma always grew them. I don't remember them having a problem, but they always grew them on trellises. And maybe they just pulled volunteers-- I don't know.

I got some Grandpa Ott's this year, but our spring and early summer were so wet and cold, I never even got them planted. I wanted to plant them along the outside of my back deck, which is off the ground 5-8 feet. Oh well. Next year.

Dayle Ann

I envy those of you who don't have trouble with them, I wish I could trade you shoes. They are so darn pretty if only............

We grow a curtain of morning glories every year to shade the back porch which faces due west. We love the coolness they provide, the beauty of the flowers, and the vigor of the vines. The seeds from the flowers fall back into the bed, but some of them fall into the yard. Ones that go where we don't want them get mowed, no problem. The rest of them just come up the next year. Works for us. MGs are not all bad. We have noticed that the dark purple ones have been the most vigorous and the pinks and blues have not reseeded like the purples. Too bad, cause we liked the mix of colors. But the shade was the real purpose of the vines and they do that just fine. Cheryl

keesha I am figuring you are gonna love this story.
remember the plight I was having with wanting to keep the morning glory tradition alive? well......it is definately alive...

Here is a pic of how it almost completely covered my little arbor

yesterday morning I was enjoying my morning coffee while looking out at my overgrown arbor

yesterday afternoon I was standing at my window wondering what happened to my arbor....the morning glories totally weighted it down to the point where it broke and fell over...lol
I went out and tried to pick it up and I couldn't cause it was too heavy! I just shake my head and say...look,Mom...I did this for you...lol
I will still have them. Just next year I will have to be more vigilant at keeping them at bay..(or buy a much stronger arbor) lol

Over the years I have grown 'Heavenly Blue' and moonflower vine with no horrible reseeding problem in a heavily mulched bed but they do need good support and plenty of room. On the other hand I have an ongoing problem with the wild small blooming pink morning glory in my vegetable garden and in a couple of rose beds and with the small red ipomoea coccinea even in well mulched areas. Cypress vine is a huge offender here also.

Is there a MG that will reseed in Zone 4? Am I missing something? Lots of chain link fence to cover. I would be thrilled....

Carol

Carol, I'm in zone 4 and they reseed like crazy for me. I don't recall the kind anymore, but probably just picked them locally. They are the pink and purple ones.

Michelle

Is there a MG variety that is non-invasive? Love the look & ability to cover ugly long (65') SW-facing wall, but afraid of them strangulatijg the other trees & plants on my lawn. I'm in Los Angeles, zone 10. TIA