What's this?

[hippywife]

Can anyone identify this? It's growing in a nice little patch in front of the house. I've never seen it before anywhere on the property in the over 10 years I've lived here. It's really very pretty and it's blanketing the area on both sides of the front steps nicely. As long as it doesn't wander out to the garden, I really have no problem with it being there. I would just like to know what it is.

Thanx!

[hippywife]

1. I've searched around and I think

that this is common chickweed. What say you gardeners?

[hippywife]

2. As you can see

I posted this long ago and no one answered but I eventually figured out it was chickweed. We've never had it before and it was growing in large mounds against the front of the house. Seems like a pretty invasive weed. Happy to report, tho, that it does have a very practical use and we wish we had more of it.

Usually when we give the chickens anything but their feed, such as veggie and fruit scraps, they fight over a single piece even when there are thirty more laying there on the ground. It looks like Toys R Us or WalMart Thanksgiving morning with a supply of only 10 of the years hottest toy in stock! LOL When we throw handfuls of this stuff in their pens, they all settle down and eat peacefully together without uttering even a single peep! It's like it's their form of catnip.

We are now close to having none of it left and not sure if the girls are going to settle for anything else. :rofl:

[bvar22]

3. Chickweed was going to be my guess....

...but I see you already identified it.

Chickweeds are Medicinal and edible, they are very nutritious, high in vitamins and minerals, can be added to salads or cooked as a pot herb, tasting somewhat like spinach. The major plant constituents in Chickweed are Ascorbic-acid, Beta-carotene, Calcium, Coumarins, Genistein, Gamma-linolenic-acid, Flavonoids, Hentriacontanol, Magnesium, Niacin, Oleic-acid, Potassium, Riboflavin, Rutin, Selenium, Triterpenoid saponins, Thiamin, and Zinc. The whole plant is used in alternative medicine as an astringent, carminative, demulcent, diuretic, expectorant, laxative, refrigerant, vulnerary.

http://www.altnature.com/gallery/chickweed.htm

I've been searching our place for it, but haven't found it lately.
It has such a good reputation as a medicinal herb and a chicken food, we may cultivate it.

[KSinTX]

4. We just consider it ground cover

There's a spot in the yard behind the pond that was constantly being trashed by the utility service guys and the chickweed was the only thing that kept surviving. Poof - one man's weed became a lazy man's ground cover! It actually looks as good as the pony foot in other parts of the yard.