Agapanthus

Agapanthus are a pretty popular plant. I gave some to a friend to plant along his front fence. When i was at his place on the weekend, I noticed that he had no flowers and asked him about it. He said that he cuts them off and that everyone in his neighbourhood does the same. He thinks the flowers don't look nice. I've never heard of people doing this. Have you, and do you know why? He's in a bit of a snooty area of Sydney. I've got the dwarf variety growing along my front fence and I'm about to get an abundance of beautiful purple flowers, which is nearly my favourite time of the year for my garden.

Seeing another post about agapanthus, spurred me to create a new one to help out anyone that want to kill their agapanthus, as every responsible gardener SHOULD.

OK, I have the magic elixer, I've been murdering these arseholes of plants for a few years now. The sooner they officially get made to be noxious weeds the better.

Here's the no-dig way to kill them dead.

For small amounts, you want Yates Tree and Blackberry killer from Bunnings or your closest nursery.mix the full 250ml bottle with 1.25L of diesel, or substitute with water and half a teaspoon of biodegradable washing up detergent.

Spray liberally and wet all the foliage.It will take a couple of weeks to a month, but they will all totally die back and turn to mush. You might have to re-apply after a few months of any new shoots emerge, but they will die much easier with a small application.

For bulk, you are going to want to buy Garlon 600. You can get it from ag sup[ply stores. Mix it the same, but in a ration of 70ml per 4L of diesel, or the water and detergent trick. Two teaspoons of detergent in the 4L quantity.

The diesel variant works the fastest, but it stinks, and is added cost.I changed to the water/detergent mix and it works just as good, but takes a couple of weeks longer.

Oh, BTW, if you have agapanthus and you let the flowers got to seed, then dont, they spread like no mans business and are all over the bushland near me in the Blue Mountains. Yes the flowers are nice and look good but piss them off before they get to seed.

I just want to rant about how much I hate this stupid hell-weed and my frustration with how much people love to plant it EVERYWHERE.

I bought this place a couple of years ago from a retired electrician a couple of years ago. It had a big, lush garden and because the previous owner spent a lot of time at home and had the time and will to maintain it, it was pretty well and kept. Lots of healthy fruit trees, an attractive pond and good trees and hedges for privacy.

However, there were also a few...interesting choices in my opinion. I don't know if that was him or the owner before him, but it's been a hell of a time trying to fix it. First, there were about 6 palm trees across the property including a fat, short phoenix palm I had to pay an arborist to remove, but we managed to chainsaw all but one down eventually (the final one is about 2 stories high and is going to be a big and expensive job to remove, so it stays...for now).

But by far the WORST thing about this place has been the abundance of Agapanthus around the property. Some of it was probably self-seeded and left to thrive, but there are big patches of it out by the roadside and most baffling of all a thick block of it in a raised bed along the front fence. When I first moved in it was so thick that it was now growing over a thick nest of roots that was about a foot of the top of the bed, and had been ignored for so long that the leaves were falling about a foot away from the wall of the bed, on top of its dead ancestors.

Last year I hacked off the top growth and the dead leaves underneath but didn't have the time or energy to get the rest of it out before getting busy with work and it was too wet to dig through. Now I'm finally tackling the rest and it has been the bane of my existence. I've figured out an attack plan of removing the green parts, then using a combination of a handsaw and a chainsaw to slice chunks off the root cluster underneath. I've cleared about a metre stretch down to the top of the bed, but its so thick with roots that I feel like I could spend days out here picking through the dirt and still not be completely done. (Sidenote: I just bought a Niwashi hand tool from Mitre 10 and I can already tell it's going to be a massive help)

I know some people think it's attractive (I don't) but I wonder if it's more like Stockholm Syndrome with this evil plant as our captor, and we've just learned to accept and embrace it because it's easier than trying to fight it.

But I'm not giving up, I will win this war.

TL;DR:

Bought a place where parts of the garden were totally overrun by agapanthus and I've decided it's time to fight back against my purple-headed captors.

I welcome any advice from fellow resistance fighters on how I can remove it more easily and prevent it from coming back, preferably with minimal chemicals but I think that might be somewhat unavoidable.