The Truth About Wisteria

For the past two weeks or so, I have been obsessed with a particular stretch of 54 that I pass on the way to and from work. This area has a wall of bright purple flowers that stretches for about half a mile and it makes me soooooooo happy! No matter how early it is or how stressed I am, passing those beautiful flowers just makes me smile. Sometimes I even remember them when I'm not in the car and I get excited just thinking about seeing them again!

So, ya, I like this area :)

Since I am just discovering this year that I live among some beautiful plants (25 years in NC and i noticed the flowers and trees THIS YEAR), I have been kind of obnoxious about asking my family and friends to identify plants that I find appealing, but nobody seems to know what my heavenly purple plant could be...

Finally I had had enough. I googled "NC vine" images and I recognized the very first picture as my purple friend! The website called the vine "wisteria" and I giggled at remembering Wisteria Lane from my Desperate Housewives days. But now I wanted MORE wisteria! Where could I see more? Where did it come from? Could I plant some in my apartment complex? I needed more information, so I found a wisteria website.

And that is when my dreams died...

"Wisteria occurs throughout North Carolina and is listed as a worst weed by The Nature Conservancy's Sandhills office. The Chinese variety of wisteria is the most frequently seen in North Carolina. When this vine escapes into forests, it climbs trees, intercepts sunlight, and kills or represses host trees. Hundreds of miles of wisteria vines are destroying trees at Raleigh's Umstead State Park. In fact, this deadly vine may be as destructive as kudzu."

So that's it. My beautiful wisteria is actually KILLING the beautiful trees it lives on!

Life just isn't fair :-(