Discussion»Questions»Human Behavior» Why do some folks nurture weeds and destroy flowers? Eye of the Beholder rules. What if the Beholder is figuratively blind?
There are other ways to behold beauty, Both our sense of smell and our sense of touch can behold the beauty of a rose in its different aspects.
But in your example it may be the beholder is after the sense if satiation he could achive baking bread from the gran that would grow in that place if only those darn weeds were not staling the the nourishment in the field where he planted wheat ;-)
Thank you for your reply JakobA. I'm pretty sure folks don't plant flowers in fields dedicated to growing food. All weeds need to be removed. I don't know if the weeds that grow among flowers and the weeds that grow in wheatfields are the same or different. Do you?
This post was edited by RosieG at October 30, 2017 5:05 AM MDT
A few id then you can also find carefully tended in flower gardens, but most of the are hardy and robust species that have survived being treated as weeds for many generations.
Every spring beautiful weeds with lovely yellow flowers crop up out of nowhere in our backyward. Jim says his mom used to call such weeds "volunteers" as well as flowers that would also appear out of nowhere. Our yellow-flowered weeds are seriously pretty. I wonder why weeds that have pretty flowers aren't called flowers? Do you know? Thank you for your reply Jakoba! :)
Yes the term "weed" is rather pejorative and just means a plant we are not interested in. They have flowers and seeds as well, many quite beautiful, but tend to be more hardy. There are some plants that are native to certain areas and grow easily and copiously. Others are invasive species that naturalize very easily and take over from native and other plants. Will usually vary by the kind of soil, climate, moisture, shade, and other factors. A field of plants growing naturally will tend to fertilize and enrich the soil if plowed under as manure.
But people have their favorites and what they want they want and many are willing to go to all kinds of lengths to make them grow. On the other hand many people don't care what grows on their property and just ignore it so all kinds of "weedy" things come up which many other people would not regard as beautiful or good to live next to or near. Many things I plant in my garden do not do well even if I am able to care for them daily while others thrive. Sometimes plants get in there and do well naturally that are quite beautiful - asters and hostas and violets and daisies etc. Many would call them "weeds" or weedy but they are just natural and I think attractive. I always let a certain amount of weedy plants grow in my garden and yard but others, mostly invasive, I pull up or try to discourage.
This is an outstandingly informative and thoughtful reply to my simple question officegirl for which I thank you. We have yellow-flowered weeds that crop up out of nowhere in our backyard each spring. Jim says they're weeds. I think they're flowers. I'm obviously not as conversant with the topic as you are. Years ago at a home we owned we planted Bamboo. Serious mistake. The bamboo grew like weeds and began choking other things out so we had to pull them out. They were very pretty and we thought benign. Not so. Thank you for your fine answer! I appreciate it! :)