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Weeds in our Area (Part One Hundred and Forty) By Bob and Ena McIntyre – Garden Route Region. UPDATED LIST: Aristolochia elegans (Dutchman's Pipe, Calico Flower) The updated list of invasive species certainly provides much food for thought. Continuing with this theme we've chosen a species which is not necessarily a threat in our area, but rather an interesting specimen. When one walks around Wilderness Village the large older gardens along Waterside Road, Melkhout Lane and Southside bear testimony to their creators' love of plants and their desire to enhance their personal surrounds evidenced by the large variety of non-indigenous plant species to be found. This tendency runs true of the older gardens in George and Knysna as well. These gardens also characterize the competitive edge of gardening as a pastime. For many gardeners the very special pleasure and challenge lie in sourcing, nurturing and successfully growing something really unusual. In this way numerous exotic plants arrived on our shores. Many of these ornamentals today have the status of special effect weeds and have invariably become problematic invasive alien species. With its very unusual flower the Aristolochia littoralis (=elegans) (Calico Flower, Dutchman's Pipe) certainly qualifies. In the gardening books of the early 1980's the Calico Flower climber is recommended as suited to the temperate and sub-tropical regions in the country. Description: The Dutchman's pipe is an evergreen vine with a dense coverage of large, bright green leaves, varying from heart- to kidney-shaped. The large heart-shaped flowers are particularly unusual -both in shape and colour. The common name Dutchmen's pipe is derived from the twisted shape of the large purple-brown flowers that are shaped like the bowl and stem of a pipe. The bowl of the pipe has white markings inside, a yellow throat and yellow markings on the outside. The winged seeds are borne in dry capsules that split like small parachutes. Invasive Status: Leslie Henderson included the Calico flower in alien Weeds and Invasive Plants 2001 as being problematic, but not allocated to a specific category at the time. On the updated list it has been upgraded to a category lb. The plants invade riverine forests and plantations. In one reference the species A. macrophylla is described as a rampant vine ideal for situations in which other climbers will not grow. A.eleqans is native to Brazil, and is an invasive species in the southern United States and Australia where the caterpillars of the threatened Richmond Birdwing Butterfly die as a result of feeding on the plants, which closely resemble their regular food source. The Calico Flower climber is poisonous. References: ALIEN WEEDS AND INVASIVE PLANTS: Lesley Henderson - Copyright @ 2001 Agricultural Research Council. A-Z of Gardening in SA: W G Sheat. www.wikipedia.org