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loonlaugh t1_jcy26wt wrote

Reply to comment by Quail-a-lot in Buying flowering bulbs “For Life”? by flyeaglesfly777

-Ack! Star of Bethlehem is a voracious and horrid invasive. (I guess it is BIFL, because you’d never get rid of it.) Listed in the Invasive Plant Atlas of the US. Known to be especially bad in the Mid-Atlantic, displacing native spring ephemerals and other ornamentals. Very difficult to remove after planting due to their vigor. (Source: a ton of research after I transplanted the pretty little white flowers from abandoned lot to my garden before looking them up, removing them “all” two months later, and have been fighting them for years since.) Please don’t plant Star of Bethlehem!

-Why avoid Breck’s? (She asked while waiting for the Breck’s bulbs she put in last fall to come up…)

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Quail-a-lot t1_jcyiseu wrote

Brecks is part of the "Direct Gardening Association" which are notoriously bad. Once you are on one mailing list, you will get a ton of spam. All of them have poor customer service, terrible shipping issues, and bad quality bulbs. They have rotten BBB and Garden Watchdog ratings, so you don't have to take my word for it:

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/1787862/anyone-order-from-breck-s-bulbs-before

https://davesgarden.com/products/gwd/c/183/

https://www.bbb.org/us/in/guilford/profile/catalog-shopping/brecks-0292-90020657/customer-reviews

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Quail-a-lot t1_jcyj7vv wrote

Haha, yeah Star-of-Bethlehem came already planted in our last house. I thinned it out a bit, but it did have some tendencies toward world domination. It was pretty well thwarted by placement next to ostrich ferns and really massive old peonies, but if there had been a garden on the other side of that fence instead of concrete they would have had a hell of time controlling it.

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