What is growing in my forsythia bush? A raspberry bush? (flowers, landscape)
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Greetings, I know almost nothing about plants, so here I am :-) I live on the front range of Colorado & my backyard is part landscaped & then there is a large wild area beyond my fence.
In the landscaped portion, I have a forsythia bush, it was just planted last year. I just noticed that something else is growing in with the forsythia. Whatever it was looks like it fruited & is reminding me of a raspberry bush, but like I said, I know nothing :-) I've had raspberries before, but they've never had thorns & this thing is very thorny.
There is a drip line going to the forsythia, so apparently whatever this bush is has found the same spot very hospitable.
Q1: Any idea what this is? Pics below
Q2: If it's something desirable like a fruit, can I leave it there in the middle of my forsythia? Should I move it? How would I do that? That spot has only 1 other plant, a lilac bush next to it. The idea was that in the Spring I would have purple & yellow color there. This is their first year & we had a very heavy Spring snow that caused both the lilac & forsythia to break a lot of branches & not do well. The forsythia did not bloom at all, the lilac surprisingly did have some small flowers.
I did try looking up the leaves, but I'm just clueless abt this stuff, they all look the same to me. I did read that some raspberries have thorns. Thanks for entertaining my question!
That looks more like a wild rose leaf than a raspberry leaf to me, and the fruits are like rose hips or tiny apples and not at all like raspberries or blackberries.
Ah, thank you both! That would explain the thorns!
Oh wait...are you guys saying the green 'ball' IS the fruit? I was thinking the fruit was on top of the starburst shape thing & had already been eaten by birds. I looked up rose hip & I see it kind of looks like a ball, so maybe the green ball is the fruit?
If it's not a raspberry bush, I want to remove it, but I love wild roses! We used to have some in Mpls. Do you think I could just transplant it to the wild portion of the property? I'm thinking it's small enough I can just dig it up maybe?
Or maybe I should just leave it there with the forsythia? I suppose it would compete for resources, but other than that, will it hurt anything to leave it there? Or is competing for resources a big deal?
Ah, thank you both! That would explain the thorns!
Oh wait...are you guys saying the green 'ball' IS the fruit? I was thinking the fruit was on top of the starburst shape thing & had already been eaten by birds. I looked up rose hip & I see it kind of looks like a ball, so maybe the green ball is the fruit?
If it's not a raspberry bush, I want to remove it, but I love wild roses! We used to have some in Mpls. Do you think I could just transplant it to the wild portion of the property? I'm thinking it's small enough I can just dig it up maybe?
Or maybe I should just leave it there with the forsythia? I suppose it would compete for resources, but other than that, will it hurt anything to leave it there? Or is competing for resources a big deal?
Depends on how large it wants to be, but if it's Colorado's native rose, it wants to be pretty darn big. Since forsythia also wants to be pretty darn big, you might have a wrestling match to the death.
I'd try digging it up. Get as much root as you can. Pop it into a 1-gallon container filled with potting mix - not native dirt. Clip off the fruits - the plant needs to put all its energy into making new roots. Water well. Put it in medium shade - with NO hot direct sun. What you've essentially done is made a big cutting that already has some roots. Wild roses are generally pretty easy to root. It may decide to drop a few leaves and it may look depressed for a while. Just be patient, and keep the soil damp but not wet. You'll know things are fine when it makes a new leaf. Then it will be time to start moving it gradually into more light. This fall, if it's doing well, put it in the ground.
The fact that it has fruits now mean that a month or so ago it had flowers. If your plant is a native, this is probably what you have - Southwest Colorado Wildflowers, Rosa woodsii
But there are cultivated shrub roses that have those wild-type leaves and flowers, so you won't really know until it flowers for you.
BTW, rose hips are edible. They have a tart apple flavor, and are rich in vitamin C. However, they ARE very seedy! (Which is how you got your plant - most likely a bird pooped a seed.)
Jacqueg I cannot rep you again, but I cannot thank you enough! Your explanation is perfect & something even a layperson like me can understand! I appreciate the links to the pic too!
I think I was looking at the fruit 'upside down' & was misunderstanding what I was seeing; it makes sense now. I love trying new things, so I may have to try the rose hip when/if they ripen! I'll cut them off for now though, to try & get the energy to the plant. We have a bunch of yucca too & I know much of those are edible. I was going to try it once, but I decided it was way too much effort to make it edible.
It may have bloomed without me seeing it, it's in a far corner of the yard, so I wouldn't have noticed unless I went looking. It's very close to the 'wild' area of the land, so there are tons of critters, birds, seeds, weeds, yucca, etc. I have so many strange things growing. This is the 2nd large plant that is coming up where 1 of my drip system ends is. I had a real bush that the landscapers planted & it died but right in the center of the hole was a giant milkweed, doing very well b/c of the drip system LOL. The real bush was still under warranty so the guy who came out to plant the replacement told me what it was.
I will do exactly as you suggested & see if we can get it to grow & plant it somewhere else. It's actually growing in pretty full sun on the south side, right now. If it doesn't make it, oh well, it'll be fun trying, but based on the pic you linked it's not quite as pretty as the wild roses I had in Mpls.
If no one mentioned already, wild roses can be invasive, so keep an eye on it and if it starts venturing out of bounds, prune it back.
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