At school I remember visiting a friends house and his father was using some form of gas bomb to try to eradicate moles. Not sure if it was effective, but I’d love to find an effective way of dealing with them.
I agree. It’ main habitat is by the sea.
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Certainly used to see a lot near the coast in UK… but I’m pleased to see it much more widespread nowadays.
Everytime I see its feathery branches wafting in springtime… I wish I had somewhere suitable… but our soil is too shallow… so we simply enjoy it in other folk’s gardens.
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Eek so maybe not great here then, not by the sea and like you Stella very shallow soil?
I suspect you have more than the 2 inches max that I have here (and then only a few spots)… other gardens in the village/commune do have Tamarix Gallica … and it certainly does NOT “need to be” by the sea… not here in France anyway … 
here, it’s a different world.
Oh gosh yes you are shallower than us! We do have large areas of the garden that are that, or even less with rock actually out! However some deeper areas too.
I highlight such bits… as I think they’re wonderful 
Oh I’d love some pics, not quite sure what to do with mine! I’ll get a PIC of their current messy / weed infestedness 
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The only thing I’ve found works so far is the explosive device sold in agricultural merchants but it has to be used each year because another load of moles arrive in the Spring to inhabit the empty tunnel - alternatively they get taken over by voles, which I don’t mind so much.
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weeds are what you make of 'em
I love to see the tiny ferns and mosses which cling to life somehow on the bits of rock…
in fact, “weed” has changed into “plante-sauvage” in my vocabulary as I’m really trying to keep as much of my little patch as natural and insect-friendly as possible.
Neighbours with their mostly pristine gardens/lawns… are kind/long-suffering … I reckon they’ve thought I’m barmy for quite some time now… 
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Well… definitely a plant… leave it alone and see what surprises arrive…
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I agree with @Stella on that one. With those leaves it could be so many things - even a plantain (weed) but it can’t be that or you’d be seeing the unmistakable head of little florets by now ( a friend described those sorts of weeds as “a million babies per plant” )
Definitely leave it and see what happens.
I had a tamarisk tree in the UK and it was very prolific - a bit too prolific for my liking but then the soil was incredibly fertile! It was nowhere near the coast so don’t worry about that.
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We have a bed with no soil, just rock and small areas where yiu can get a fork in about 4 or 5cms. We’ve found the trick is to start small. Tamarisk grow in the most inhospitable conditions, and if you start them young their roots will find a way. So a teeny, tiny rooted cuttimg perhaps.
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It’s looks like a phlox or golden rod plant.
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Unless my eyes are deceiving me, which they might well be, there’s a bud in the centre of one of the plantlets, so @toryroo may find out fairly soon!
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I hope it hurries up as I want to plant a hydrangea there if it’s a weed!
Is this near a water-source then… ??? I know hydrangeas do love water and hate drought… (in my experience)
and I’m just wondering if it might be better to put such planting on hold until the autumn… ???
Loads in the Tarim basin and generally in Xinjiang province I’m told.