Help with plant ID please

[jondavy]

Can anyone help me out with identifying this plant, i've got quite a few of them popping up around a house we've just moved to.

Any help would be much appreciated.


Jon.

 

[Petey]

could be acanthus?

 

[jondavy]

Definatly not acanthus, I used to have a load of those at a different place, the leaves on this thing arn't smooth and are too light in colour.

Bit more info, the bits of leaf stem that can be seen are covered in white hairs and are a light green but with purple dots and blotches, this can just about be made out in one of the pics.

My concern it that it may me giant hogweed, but then I could be miles off. If it is it's going to get a good dose of roundup as soon I get a positive id, but I don't want to kill them off if turns out the be a really nice harmless plant.


Jon.

 

[stuart f]

Hi John, it looks like Giant Hogweed to me,i've just looked at my book,Umbellifers of the British Isles.

Heres a link also,http://www.british-wild-flowers.co.uk/H-Flowers/Hogweed, Giant.htm

Cheers Stuart.

 

[Barn Owl]

Take it your on a river Jon.

Sounds like giant hogweed with the hairs and coloured blotches.

 

[treelore]

its giant hogs weed....spray it off with round up to kill it ! or get someone in to do it for you ! the sap if it gets on your skin can give you painful blisters !

 

[jondavy]

We're not that close to the river but I know they are more common along waterways.

I've seen quite a few larger specimins but never a baby one, i've been keeping my eye on it and even though it's still a small plant it's growing at quite a rate. Last year there was a full sized giant hogweed growing at the roadside only about 500yds from where we are so that got me thinging.
We only moved here a couple of months ago so have no idea what suprises the garden holds, this may be first of many.

Anyway it looks like the plants will be getting their first dose of roundup in the morning. It's a shame to kill them as they really are magificent plants but I don't want them around when i've got two young girls running about.

Thanks for the help.


Jon.

 

[treelore]

if round up is`nt up to it jon, get a local tree surgeon to spray it off with timberall...it kill anything ! a bit off cherry diesel works wonder too.

 

[stuart f]

Hi Jon,a posionous weed but still a useful weed,dead and dried stalks make nice containers though.

Hogweed quiver at the back of photo.

And a Hogweed container,and an Angelica stalk needle container in middle of photo.

Cheers Stuart.

 

[jondavy]

Very nice, i'd overlooked the fact that the stems could be used, I think the biggest i've seen would be about 3 inch diameter.

It's not the poisonous bit that I have a problem with, i've seen the chemical type burns and uv sensitivity that comes from getting the sap on your skin.
If it was just me living here i would be tempted to let one grow as a specimin plant, but with kids running around I wouldn't want them getting scared for life because they ran into one in the garden.

 

[Toddy]

You could just eat it to death..........Xylaria posted recipes for them a wee while back

cheers,
Toddy

 

[stuart f]

Very nice, i'd overlooked the fact that the stems could be used, I think the biggest i've seen would be about 3 inch diameter.

It's not the poisonous bit that I have a problem with, i've seen the chemical type burns and uv sensitivity that comes from getting the sap on your skin.
If it was just me living here i would be tempted to let one grow as a specimin plant, but with kids running around I wouldn't want them getting scared for life because they ran into one in the garden.

Very true Jon,kids and Giant hogweed are not a good mix,better playing safe with this one.

I remember a story when i was a kid,about a young lad that had made a pea shooter out of a Giant Hogweed stem,he was taken to hospital with quite badly burned lips,its was,nt long after the local council started an extermination programme of this weed.

Cheers Stuart.

 

[stuart f]

You could just eat it to death..........Xylaria posted recipes for them a wee while back

cheers,
Toddy

Hi Mary,was Xylaria on about Hogweed(Heracleum sphondylium) or Giant Hogweed(Heracleum mantegazzianum) as i ,ve never heard of eating the later.:bluThinki

Im intrigued now

Cheers Stuart.

 

[mochasidamo]

Seeds viable for 7-15 years. Be popping up for a while yet . Sort of plant people move house to avoid (my parents did that when I was little cos of a Horsetail forest).

Trisha

 

[locum76]

Hi Mary,was Xylaria on about Hogweed(Heracleum sphondylium) or Giant Hogweed(Heracleum mantegazzianum) as i ,ve never heard of eating the later.:bluThinki

Im intrigued now

Cheers Stuart.

me too, I cannae get my head round that one... :bluThinki

 

[locum76]

Seeds viable for 7-15 years. Be popping up for a while yet . Sort of plant people move house to avoid (my parents did that when I was little cos of a Horsetail forest).

Trisha

Really, 15 years! thats rare for an umbellifer. I thought all umbellifers had poor seed viablity?

 

[Toddy]

They're edible but must be gathered with great care and you *must* cook them first. Popped into boiling water and that kills the photosensitising sap. Furocourmarins are the problem apparantly.

I've gone agoogling after you two raised queries.
I can find no one saying that the giant hogweed is edible, in fact I keep coming across warnings, yet I know I've been served it and eaten it......I think tbh this is one to say *don't eat* unless anyone else coroborates it's edibility.
Most comments are like this one
http://www.countrylovers.co.uk/wildfoodjj/rwfgrcs8.htm


Personally I think I'd only eat the hogweed when it's about the size it is in those photos.

Not going to be fun redding it out of a garden with toddlers, especially if it seeded last year

Common hogweed cooks easily, is good in tarts and the like.

Xylaria, I'm sorry if I have maligned one of your posts

cheers,
Toddy

 

[locum76]

The potato and hawthorn leaf salad on the countrylovers site could be a winner though.

 

[jondavy]

I've heard before about the seeds remaining viable for upto 15 years.

The area where most of them are looks like it's been used as a dumping ground for soil and garden waste (probably from other places) so that's probably how they came to be here.

I went out with the roundup this morning and gave them all a good squirt so hopefully that should sort out the current batch. As I went round I kept finding smaller and smaller ones, makes me really glad that I bothered to check out what they were or I could have had a real problem if they had grown to a good size.

Thanks
Jon.

 

[xylaria]

The original photo looks like hogweed to me not giant hogweed. Hogweed is soft and downy on the underside and giant hogweed is bristly. HOWEVER I think it is important than no-one eats hogweed unless they could very confidently by themselves tell the two apart. I aint sure from the photos.

If I had normal edible when cooked hogweed in my garden or allotment I would dig it out completely (round-up doesn't work quite as well as a spade). It is tastes nice but left to its own natural habit it is very greedy, and like parsnips, and some other plants it can give rashs in contact with light, but not as bad as giant hogweed. . It is common enough in hedgerows that I feel no need to cultivate it. you should wear gloves weeding it, if think it is giant hogweed be really very careful. With the gaint hogweed if you get the sap on you skin wash it off immediately and then cover it for 3 days. The chemical from the gaint hogweed smells like rose petals when it reacts with your skin and light, so you can tell if you have any sap on you by sniffing your skin.