Creeping bellflower: The pretty purple flower taking over Twin Cities gardens
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Creeping bellflower is everywhere. The perennial plant grows purple flower stalks two to three feet tall in yards all over the Twin Cities.
Those pretty flowers are deceiving — creeping bellflower is actually invasive to Minnesota and can choke out native plants.
“Your garden starts with a few pretty purple flowers. After each flower has been able to make thousands of seeds, a few years down the road, you have nothing but bellflower,” Twin Cities gardener Cole Yates told MPR News host Catharine Richert.
Creeping bellflower was introduced to Minnesota from eastern Europe more than 100 years ago as an ornamental plant. Unlike other invasive species like buckthorn, the bellflower is spread mainly by humans, not by birds.
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Yates is behind a grassroots effort to eradicate the plant from Twin Cities gardens.
He launched bellno.com and is gathering signatures to ask the Minnesota Department of Agriculture to categorize creeping bellflower as a noxious weed, which would ban people from planting it or letting it seed. The plant is already restricted in Wisconsin.
“This is a plant that, if we educate people, we can stop,” Yates said.
The University of Minnesota-Extension recommends pulling all parts of the plant’s roots and flowers by hand, smothering with a newspaper or using herbicides.
Bellno.com also includes advice for when to pull the flower, when to dig and what to spray.
Yates spoke with MPR News host Catharine Richert about the plant and his eradication efforts.
Press play above to listen to their conversation.
