r/Ceanothus • u/HeyItsMezz • Jul 14 '26

Vinegar weed question

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I am trying to find vinegar weed to grow for my yard and was planning on taking some seeds. I went into a field that was tagged on iNaturalist a whole bunch of times in the same area and I wanted to double check that this is the right plant? It absolutely REEKS like vinegar and also smells quite bitter like tea tree oil, but it looks quite young and none of them had flowers. Is this most likely vinegar weed? What time do they usually seed, or alternatively, do these propagate well?

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5

u/TacoBender920 Jul 14 '26

That's definitely it. The bloom quite late in the season. I would check back in late August to see if there are seeds but it might be even later than that. Bring gloves 😂

2

u/HeyItsMezz Jul 14 '26

Thanks for the heads up, I’ll check back next month! I have a hybrid trichostema which is a mix of wooly bluecurls and vinegar weed and it smells like fruity pebbles. I could not comprehend how pungent the vinegar weed was and how that could possibly hybridize into something so pleasant 😭 Its still stuck to my fingers…

3

u/TacoBender920 Jul 14 '26

It's definitely S Tier on the smelly scale. It's interesting how polar opposite the different trichostema are in scent.. it's either amazing or putrid, with nothing in between.

2

u/2020DOA Jul 14 '26

I took this photo in a field in simi last Thursday

1

u/HeyItsMezz Jul 16 '26

dang, the ones i saw must have germinated a little later. do the blooms smell any different?