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Mystery plant10 Sep '04 8:43 pm
Can someone help? The oddest thing has popped up amongst the courgettes and I'm not much good at flowering things (if you can't eat it, I don't grow it!)
It looks sort of like nicotiana - on steroids! Its 5 feet tall and still going, has furry stalkless leaves nearly 2 feet long and a massive cluster of tubular flowers with small pink petals. The garden was lawn before we built raised beds filled with horse/goat muck and I have no idea where it came from.
Should I pull it up?
Cal
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Bex
website manager
Camberwell, London
12 Sep '04 2:19 am
Welcome to the forums, Cal.
Sounds like the goats ate something and passed on a present to you! Do you have a picture of this mystery plant which you could upload?
ps for anyone confused, courgettes = zucchinni 
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13 Sep '04 10:13 pm
Hi, here's a photo of the beast! The petals are pink, though they don't look like it here.
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Swallowstitch
honoured contributor
Geraldine New Zealand
Mystery Plant15 Sep '04 7:08 pm
It is a bit hard to tell as the photo is not a close up but could it be Comfrey?
If it is you have both a useful and a problem plant, a problem in that it is a bit of a thug and likes to crowd out it's neighbours with its aggressive root system and myriad seedlings, but very useful in compost or potato trenches(beneath the planted potato), makes great, if stinky liquid fertilizer when covered in water and left to ferment.
What do others think?Am I right with my guess?
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15 Sep '04 9:20 pm
Hi Swallowstitch
Thanks for your interest, but I do know that it isn't comfrey. I have a small herb nursery and I know comfrey well. This plant is not dissimilar, but the leaves come out at regular intervals up the stem, not from a clump as comfrey does. Also, comfrey leaves (at least MY comfrey leaves) have a stem. This thing has stalkless leaves that wrap around the main stalk. The flower spike is similar in shape but there are many more flowers in each 'clump' and they are quite different in shape. They have a tube about 5cms long then pink petals sticking out (0.5cms) at right angles.
Cal
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teecee
honoured member
West Otago, New Zealand
16 Sep '04 9:34 am
Swallowstitch knows I like a challenge to name plants! I think the mystery plant is Nicotiana rustica - wild tobacco. Don't know whether it can be used as tobacco though. 
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Swallowstitch
honoured contributor
Geraldine New Zealand
Mystery plant Identified16 Sep '04 6:07 pm
Well Hi tee cee!  Fancy meeting you here 
OK everyone, if tee cee says its a baccy plant then you can bet your boots that's what it is.
All our garden mystery plants will now be easily and quickly idenitified from leaf, flower and seed...tee cee is a walking font of knowledge and I am not exaggerating. She's a whizz.
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16 Sep '04 9:28 pm
Hi Tee Cee, THANKS! I had an idea that it was some sort of nicotiana but couldn't find any other piccies anywhere that looked like this one. But then , I never found any of N. rustica! As to where it came from...
Off now to chop its head off. Its a great thing to look at, but I really do need some space in the veg patch next year.
Thanks again
Cal
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teecee
honoured member
West Otago, New Zealand
17 Sep '04 10:04 am
Aw gee, Swallowstitch! Now I will be too scared to say anything in case they believe you!
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olwen
valued member
Blenheim
1 Oct '04 7:26 pm
It looks awfully like the tobaccoo (smoking variety) that I grow.
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