PlantFiles: Cheeseweed Mallow, Little Mallow, Small-flowered Mallow
Malva parviflora

This weed is the bane of my existence! This weed is all over in my back yard in suburban Denver and has been for years, no matter what I do. This plant is native to northern Africa and southern Europe and does not belong here! This is a great example of why we should learn how to have a beautiful garden with native plants and NOT introduce new plants that evolved on the other side of the planet! I swear the name should be changed to "Zombie Weed" because it won't die!! I'm the last person to ever recommend roundup, but weed-b-gon does not phase this plant! Soak the ground and pull the whole root out, or pull/cut it when you recognize the leaf so it won't go to seed. Or...you could try pouring concrete over your entire yard.

This weed is horrible! It grew taller than me (5 feet) and is very hard to get rid of. The roots are deep so at first we used the weed eater to cut them down thinking it would be easier to pull when they popped back up. Nope! We put down weed killer, waited a week then soaked the grass overnight for two nights trying to make the soil soft enough so the weeds would pull out easier. Lots of back breaking hard work. Helped a lot but they are still coming back. This is the first year we've ever seen this weed. Last winter there were strong winds with the rainy season and they blew in from somewhere!
Wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy!!

this plant must serve some purpose, but i wouldnt wish it on anyone. cant get rid of it, no flower to speak of, deep roots and runners. ugh ! It is also host to scantius egyptus, a bug that is spreading across california at an alarming rate.

This stuff is incredibly invasive and nearly impossible to eradicate. It looks nice in spring, but once it blooms it gets leggy and ugly. The seed pods 'pop' to scatter seed everywhere. I've seen it go through 4 generations in one growing season. It spreads by lateral underground runners making a colony of them extremely difficult to pull. Any root left in the ground will produce a new plant. I wish I could triple-negative this plant.

This looks very much like an herb I've grown from seed purchased from Nichols that they call malva verticillata. They recommend it as a garnish, like parsley. I've grown this for years as an annual in various northern gardens. Its a little weedy, but I like it. The leaves are pretty and frilly in much the way lady's mantle is, but it grows quite tall--four feet in a good year. The flowers are white and fairly inconspicuous. This may be a different plant, but the photos looks the same.

I like this plant so far! I was clearing out some unused pots with soil and overgrown weeds from last year when I saw this among the weeds I was pulling from one particular pot I had beans growing in last year. It looked interesting, but I did not know what it was, so I kept it in the pot. It started with only 3 small leaves, but within 2 weeks this plant has grown to over 2 feet tall. It has very beautiful leaves, and I cannot find it growing anywhere else on my property, so I was calling it my "gift from heaven" until I just now discovered it's true name. It has very small white flowers, very easy to miss unless you look closely. Hopefully I will be able to get some pictures of my own baby posted here soon!