A question about Monarda Sahins Lavender
 

aka Bergamot. Wondered if anyone can tell me if Bergamot is likely to self sow and spread like crazy? In a Nursery sale list I received this morning there is this particular one with nice shaggy lavender flowers and there's another called Monarda Jacob Klein which has large brilliant red mop heads.

Bergamot will spread--it grows wild here in fields and seems to thrive in the sandy soils here. The lavender one is probably a cultivar of our lavender Wild Bergamot ([I]Monarda fistulosa[/I]) and the red a cultivar of our wild Bee Balm ([I]Monarda didyma[/I]). But it's not that vigorous a self-[I]sower [/I]in my experience--it spreads more readily by rhizome, instead. So if I want to contain it in an area, I just contain the roots with some sort of barrier.

Not sure what it might do in your neck of the woods, though. Is there some place to check to see if it's considered invasive in your area?

I'll ask that on the garden forum, Hazel, thanks . We're on red clay here under a foot or so of nice topsoil. I loved the look of your Bee Balm. I have to be careful that nothing escapes into the State Forest over the road. Whoever lived here before us dropped some Pickly Pear over there, also some Freesia bulbs and they multiply all the time. I might Google invasive plants and see what comes up. This Nursery has those two plants as either new, rare or unusual by the way.

I have a deep red Bee Balm at the cottage and its not as fast spreading as the purple but in your climate I don't know how that would go as ours dies down each year to nothing don't think yours would. As for self seeding I have not seen it come up anywhere else than where I have planted it. Hope this helps

Thanks for that, maybe I will buy just the red one. I re-read what I said before and I meant Prickly Pear by the way, a type of cacti that caused havoc in the outback in the old days. So many plants become invasive here unfortunately.