Tumbling Tumbleweeds

Tumbleweeds are so iconic of the American West: blowing about on the wide-open spaces, a fixture of western movies, almost as recognizable as the cowboy.

They are also awful.

We live in the land of the tumbleweed, which is actually an invasive plant called a Russian thistle. They grow big, plentiful, and prickly, drying in the ground and then getting uprooted by the wind to blow about and disperse their seeds.

Still firmly rooted and biding their time.

They are wretched plants. They are stiff and sharp, embed their prickers into the sheep's wool, and this year, they are EVERYWHERE.

We must have gotten rain at just the right time for them, because I've never seen so many. Even the one year when they formed a solid four-foot-high bank of tumbleweeds against the garden fence, I don't remember seeing so many in the ground. They're currently still rooted, but in the next month, they'll start blowing free, and then we're really in for it. 

All the dark patches in this field are Russian thistle.

There's really nothing to be done about them at this stage except wait for them to build up against fencing and then pitch-fork them into piles to burn. And hope that next year isn't such a banner year for them.