This one crept into my backyard a couple years ago, and suddenly last season I noticed it had pretty much taken over the whole thing! I live by water, so was pulling by hand. What a tough job, and I was only able to keep up enough to contain it and keep it from spreading further.

I see it a lot in Forest Lake yards. There's a local compost here, where you can take the nice black dirt after it's been through the process. I'm sure people dump it, and it ends up in others' back yards.

I remember the smell of this plant from playing in my grandma's backyard in Owatonna when I was a kid.

We had this stuff all around the edges of our yard at our old house in Elk River, but we called it creeping charlie. My siters would bring me big handfuls to braid into fairy crowns.

We also refer it this plant as Creeping charlie. I am glad to see its a NX now I will not feel bad about yanking it out. Its very difficult to keep up with, I would like to avoid using harsh chemicals but vinegar and pulling the weeds isnt doing that much good.

It is unavoidable that use of chemicals comes up in dealing with aggressive non-natives. Ultimately cost/benefit comes into play. While most conservationists are familiar with Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" that brought to discussion the impacts of chemicals such as DDT on native bird populations, the same harsh reality is coming into play as song bird populations are crashing as habitats are becoming overwhelmed by foreign plants (Doug Talamy - Bringing Nature Home). A well managed landscape that focuses on maintaining a diverse mix of native plants diminishes the needs for long term pesticide use while providing essential food a nesting resources for imperiled wildlife. If you are just going to acquiesce to a sterile blue grass lawn & a rocked in foundation planting - no don't use harsh chemicals - you are just adding insult to injury.

Don't really understand what the fuss is about. I find mowing once to 1.5 inches gets rid of almost all the ground ivy (normally I would never mow that low). The remains are easily pulled. Plant natives (woodland-type near trees) to keep new growth in check. I have never seen it take hold in sunny tall grass areas, either.

Personally I think it's pretty, and the bees definitely love the stuff, too. So I don't mind having patches of it, and I wouldn't call them an "infestation", lol. Basically the only place where the ground ivy is somewhat aggressive is shaded monospecies lawn areas, where it competes successfully with the exotic grass. Having a thick and somewhat taller established lawn would probably help but in the end it's just the way grasses work, or don't work, near trees.

Some things I'd love to know is how its seeds respond to fire and how it does in the mow-less fescue mixes, the kind that curls over.

Oh and many, many thanks for the lovely site!

This plant is *not* on the NX list. The last pages of the first link has the full list of secondary NXs: http://www.mda.state.mn.us/plants/pestmanagement/weedcontrol/~/media/Files/plants/weeds/weedlaw.ashx http://www.mda.state.mn.us/plants/badplants/noxiouslist.aspx http://plants.usda.gov/java/noxious?rptType=State&statefips=27

Jane, I don't think anyone has claimed creeping charlie is a noxious weed—I know I haven't. It is nonetheless very much a non-native invasive species.

I suspect bees love creeping charlie because urbania/suburbia is so ecologically sterile that there isn't much else for them to feed on except weeds—they take what they can get. But creeping charlie is not just an urban weed that infests blue-grass lawns. It also invades woodlands.

There is some state forest land not far from the Metro that has some wonderful plant life, including Jacob's ladder, bloodroot, blue phlox, wild ginger, trilliums, and other beautiful native woodland species. It is a rich eco-system that is at serious risk of destruction. The last time we were there, just a week or so ago, many weed species were encroaching on it, primarily creeping charlie, day lilies, wild parsnip and buckthorn. These are all aggressive breeders. I fear the beautiful forest land will not survive their onslaught.

I'm curious... does this matter to you at all? BTW, I would have emailed you about this but you did not supply a valid email address.

This is the other terrible plant I battle. It, and campanula rapunculoides, are rampant on the slope up to my south property line. This may not be classified as an Invasive Species, but it is really strongly invasive. In lawns, in gardens, in woods. Again, if a plant type spreads, is virtually impossible to get rid of, and is not native to our area - it does not belong here. Thank you for this site - and the information on invasives and why we need to be outside noticing what's growing!

I always have small amounts of this in my yard, which I manage to keep in check by regular pulling. There are terrible infestations of this in Bison Creek Park (a Coon Rapids city park) just a couple blocks from me. There are masses of it crowding out the other vegetation on the woodland edge.

Along the Trazona Trail about a week ago.

This stuff is terrible and spreads at an incredible rate! It spread from the ditches along the road into our alfalfa field which fed our horse. Every year the alfalfa yield is smaller, and the horse won't touch the stuff, so it renders a portion of the field completely useless. I see no beauty in it!