Flowers at center of suburban dispute

PLANO, Texas, April 18 (UPI) -- A Texas couple says they've downsized their garden display of spring bluebonnets, a state tradition, after their homeowners association threatened legal action.

Eddie and Melissa Smith's bluebonnet bonanza began five years ago with three plants from a local Plano, Texas, home-improvement store, The Dallas Morning News reported Sunday.

Explosive growth followed, and the bluebonnets spread over the Smith's entire lawn and jumped the sidewalk to curve around their corner lot, the newspaper said.

"We didn't add more seeds, didn't fertilize, didn't water any extra," Melissa Smith said. "It was God's handiwork."

But not everyone was a fan.

The Ridgeview Park Homeowners Association demanded the Smiths mow the bluebonnets and re-sod the front lawn, the Morning News said. Eventually, the association sent a certified letter through a Dallas law office requiring the Smiths to conform to the "aesthetic harmony" of the subdivision.

"It's funny to us that we can get in such trouble for growing the Texas state flower," Melissa Smith said.

The Smiths and the association have reached a compromise. The couple can keep the wildflowers as long as they are contained in flowerbeds. Any not in beds have to be mowed away or controlled with weed killer, the Morning News said.