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Photo credit: Baltimore Sun/Kim Hairston 

My Baltimore Sun colleague Jean Marbella writes today that the ivy covered-walls in the outfield of Camden Yards are ivy-covered no more.

Some kind of soil pathogen attacked the ivy, and Nicole Sherry, head groundskeeper for the baseball yard, had to tear it all out. The wall that attractes the batter's eye will be painted "Camden green," until Sherry can get a new variety of ivy going.

Although Jean's account is delightful, I have to say, I tear ivy out of my gardens by the fistful and my neighbors battle it back off tree trunks where it can suck the life out of trees.

Baseball has its own rules for the ivy that catches a batter's eye, Jean reports. It has to be uniform in color and it can't lose its leaves in fall or have blossoms.

And it isn't allowed to be dead.