Marion Radawetz was walking through her garden to fill the bird bath when she spotted a pretty yellow flower growing underneath a japonica bush on the edge of her driveway.

“The beauty of the flower drew me. I was going to pick it,” she said.

However, when she got closer, she realized that the stem of the plant looked like a rose stem, covered in evil-looking spines.

She thought she recognized it from a warning in a story about invasive plants as a noxious weed, so she decided she’d better pull it out.

Donning a pair of leather gloves, she gripped it near the bottom of the stem and yanked it out.

The woody root wasn’t very young, so she assumes it was a fairly young plant, but she’s curious how it arrived in her garden.

She pressed it between cardboard to preserve it until it could be identified positively.

She says it “sounded like a bristly brush. It crackled and crunched when I tried to press it.”

Radawetz, who lives near East Boundary and Elk Roads in West Kelowna, wanted to warn others in that area about the evil-looking and spiny plant she has now identified as buffalobur nightshade.

Rhoda Mueller, bylaw enforcement officer at the regional district, says she expects it was brought in by birds. One has also been identified in Peachland.

It’s native in the southern U.S., but it has been moving north and it can cause painful injuries to animals or people who come in contact with it.

Every part of the plant has spines, and they contain poisonous alkaloids.

If you spot it, get rid of it by carefully pulling it out and making sure it doesn’t set seed.

Because it’s an annual, it’s of less concern than some invasive alien plants, because preventing seed production can keep its spread at bay, she noted.

If you’re unsure about the identification of it, contact her at the regional district office.

Long sharp thorns cover the stems and surround the flowers.

They even line the veins on top of the deeply-lobed leaves. Its yellow flowers are similar to those of the tomato plant, and are followed by wickedly spiny burrs which can be very painful if stepped on. It grows less than a foot tall.

jsteeves@kelownacapnews.com