Although you have not purchased these items, we have decided to respond to your review publicly as you raise a good debate. We are a small farm so responding has not been a top priority.
It is important to note that we are a BC based company and none of the plants you reviewed as a 'noxious weed' are on the invasive species list.
There are a number of lists of invasive species from all over Canada and in myour experience these understandably err on the side of caution. We have farmed here in Metchosin BC for over 20 years and our owner travels BC extensively for work as an ethnobotanist. We are constantly amazed at the small pockets of English ivy and blue periwinkle that tenaciously survive in places like the rugged west coast and even north near the Alaska boarder in old homesteads where they were planted 80+ years ago. Some plants are not to be underestimated!!
This being said we are careful not to offer any seeds for sale that we know through experience will get out of hand. with Dame’s rocket being one of them. We would never, for example, grow or offer California poppy or Queen Anne’s lace (both key ingredients in most commercially-available wildflower mixes). While we are aware that Dame’s rocket, Flander’s poppy, Dame's Rocket (etc.) are on some invasive lists, we have yet to see this in practice here. We have grown a small patch of Dame’s rocket and Mullein at our farm for 20 years and while Dame's Rocket occasionally pops up in a nearby bed of worked soil it’s never once spread into my hay field or Garry oak meadow restoration. One reason for this is that the seeds are quite heavy and are not wind-borne, and birds do not eat them. The blooms are heavenly-scented and the plants are literally alive with pollinators in the flowering season.
Our relationship with invasive plants can also be complicated. While we probably spend 15-20 hours a year cutting back Himalayan blackberries (actually native to Armenia, but that’s another story) here at our farm every year and have regretfully concluded that we cannot completely eradicate them, we do appreciate how much the pollinators love the nectar and we do harvest and enjoy the fruit (which also means less seeds for the birds to spread). But we would never propagate or sell this plant.
Finally, we are quick to recognise known invasive species. The plants that have been introduced and are choking out our natural world. However, we often do not recognise that many of our cultivated plants have the propensity to become invasive or 'noxious weeds'. We also do not frequently criticise wild fruit trees from non-native varities that have made their homes here.
While these plants can become problematic, they offer a wide variety of benefits to individuals gardens that are not always possible with native species. That being said, we stress the need for people to take care when gardening, especially with aggressive plant types. We stress that people stop buying, selling, and sowing non-native wildflower mixes. In the indoor plant space, we stress that people leave cuttings and plants they wish to dispose of in the hot sun until they are completely dry. If they have seeds they should be burnt or disposed of in landfill. Too many of these plants have ended up in the natural world and they are devastating (English Ivy being a common one).
All that being said. We respect your efforts to eradicate invasive species from the natural world; and your efforts to make Albertans aware of plants they cannot possess or grow based on the provincial rules in that province.
