joene's garden » Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group

The hypericum experiment: may be a Gardening Oops.

joenesgarden — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 05:00:00 +0000

The 2011 calendar has flipped from June to July which means it's time for another episode in my ongoing Gardening Oops – aka GOOPs – series. Even after more than thirty years of gardening, I still make mistakes and missteps. I share them here to try to prevent you from making the same faux pas and to encourage some back-and-forth dialogue. After reading this July 2011 GOOPs installment, I hope you will share your thoughts and, better yet, a GOOPs of your own.

I had a lot of fun visiting a local plant sale back in May. It's an annual fundraiser for a garden club and I found some really nice plant divisions at good prices. One of the plants I brought home is a small hypericum – commonly known as St. John's Wort - shrub. I've not grown hypericum before and wanted to give it a try.

I did some research after bringing the shrub home that showed hypericum prolificum has an invasive tendency in Connecticut. It may escape cultivation and naturalize. On the other hand the Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group had no hypericum listed as invasive.

As my knowledge of invasive and native vegetation grows, I've become very careful to not add invasive plants to my gardens and to manage those I unknowingly planted years ago so they don't spread.

Unfortunately, I don't know the cultivar of the hypericum I purchased. This is one of the downsides of purchasing divided plants at local plant sales. It could very well be that I don't have hypericum prolificum. I could have hypericum perforatum – common St. John's Wort – which appears to be okay.

I considered letting my small hypericum shrub die but changed my mind. I decided to plant the shrub in a stone-wall encircled raised bed surrounded by lawn. I can see this bed from the desk in my office so I'm sure to stay on top of how it is acting. I'm going to get to know it for a year … see how it behaves and see if I can more accurately identify its likely cultivar after seeing it flower. But, if it begins to spread, or I see any signs of unwanted hypericum volunteers during this time the shrub is a goner and I'll chalk up this experience to lesson learned … use caution when grabbing plant bargains at plant sales.

So now it's your turn. Please share any hypericum experience you have and certainly share a GOOPs of your own in a comment below or on your own blog. Just be sure to leave a teaser to entice visits your blog to read your July 2011 GOOPs.

Happy gardening … may my faux pas not be yours.

Categories: Gardening, General, GOOPs-Gardening Oops.
Tags: Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group, gardening in Connecticut, Hypericum, St. John's Wort.

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Connecticut’s Barberry phase-out

joenesgarden — Sat, 11 Sep 2010 02:29:52 +0000

The Connecticut Nursery and Landscape Association (CNLA) recently called for a voluntary ban of 25 cultivars of Japanese barberry (Berberis thunbergii). The parent species – in photo to the right - has overtaken much of Connecticut forestland and large stands of the thorny green woody shrub appear to act as optimal host areas for Lyme-disease carrying ticks. As reported by CNLA, the 3-year phase-out includes the 25 cultivars that are most prolific at seed production. Another 18 cultivars – those at the bottom 10% for seed production – are not included in this voluntary ban. Click here to read the full CNLA report and the list of banned and permitted barberry cultivars.

It takes years of research to determine just how invasive a plant is in a specific area. We are fortunate to have an active research facility at the University of Connecticut. There, Dr. Mark Brand and colleagues continue research into the invasiveness of Japanese barberry. To date, research shows 13 of the banned cultivars producing more seeds – from 9900 to 1150 seeds per plant - than the wild/parent Japanese barberry which produces about 1100 seeds. Seed production is key to invasiveness. Birds eat seeds, partially digest them, then deposit still viable seed wherever their droppings drop.

While I applaud CNLA's urging of its member nurseries to ban the heaviest seed producing barberry shrubs and its call for increased public education of the issue, I remain concerned that non-CNLA affiliates might ignore the ban and continue selling potentially invasive Japanese barberry to an unsuspecting or uneducated gardening public. These are popular shrubs, particularly the red- and gold-tinged cultivars, and what the public wants the public usually gets, one way or another.

Therefore, the best way to complement CNLA's voluntary ban is to inform the gardening public of the potential invasiveness of most, and possibly all but a handful of Japanese barberry shrub types. Research currently shows the cultivars Aurea Nana, Aurea, Bagatelle, Golden Devine, and B. x mentorensis with the lowest seed production – ranging from zero to 11 per shrub. Of these Aurea Nana, Aurea, and Golden Devine sport yellow leaves, while Bagatelle is red and x mentorensis is green.

If you must have this thorny shrub in your landscape, at least make sure to plant one of the types least likely to produce a plethora of seeds for birds to eat and spread through their droppings.

The parent cultivar has done a bang-up job of spreading itself throughout much of Connecticut's woodlands. It's not an attractive plant and it's thorniness makes what should be a pleasant stroll through the woods a very unpleasant experience. Then there's the tick factor, and the last thing we need is ever-expanding tick habitats.

Read related stories in Garden Center Magazine and the Hartford Courant. To learn more about invasive plants in Connecticut visit Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group's website or, better yet, attend the invasive plant symposium on October 14, 2010 at UConn in Storrs.

Categories: Conferences/Shows, Gardening, Invasives.
Tags: Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group, Connecticut Nursery and Landscape Association, Dr. Mark Brand, Japanese barbery ban, University of Connecticut.

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Symposium on Managing Invasive Plants

joenesgarden — Sat, 21 Aug 2010 02:20:08 +0000

Attention homeowners, landscape pros, gardeners, and anyone else interested in managing invasive plant species in Connecticut. Note the date listed below – October 14, 2010 – when the Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group presents an all day symposium on managing invasive plants.

Connecticut is blessed with beautiful woodlands and open spaces that are rapidly being overrun by invasive plants. It's important to understand how to manage invasives, such as Japanese barberry (left) which is easy to identify as one of the first shrubs to leaf out in the spring. Japanese barberry has thorny stems and sports red, oblong shaped berries in late summer and fall.

Bittersweet is another common invasive plant that vines up anything – trees, shrubs, building walls, stone walls. It twists around stems, trunks, fence posts, or anything that allows vertical growth. Mature vines produce gold berries in the fall that open to a round orange-red center. Many like to use the berries in fall decorations but don't realize any dropped berries can sprout into fast growing bully-vines. Those feeling shaky in identifying bittersweet should watch for the berries this fall – they will be common along roadsides – and take note of the vines from whence they grow. Then next spring and early summer it will be easier to ID new bittersweet sprouts and pull them before they become a problem. We make a spring ritual of pulling small Japanese barberry and bittersweet, with its telltale orange roots, from the woods surrounding our home.

Both Japanese barberry and bittersweet are rapidly overtaking CT land, but there are many other invasives vying for space – Autumn Olive, Winged Euonymus (aka Burning Bush), Mile-a-minute vine, Norway Maple, Multiflora rose, and garlic mustard to name a few - that need proper, effective management. Don't think that cutting them off at soil level will prevent re-growth or spread … take the time to learn how to properly manage each invasive. If unable to attend the symposium – see complete info below - then visit the website of the Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group for identification facts and photos, and proper eradication hints.

Register for the symposium by September 18 to save $15.

NEWS RELEASE

UConn Symposium to Discuss Invasive Species in Connecticut

For more information:
Donna Ellis, (860) 486-6448, donna.ellis@uconn.edu

#10061 August 19, 2010
STORRS, Conn – The Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group will present «Challenges and Successes: Working Cooperatively to Manage Invasive Plants», a one-day symposium at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, on Thursday, October 14 from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
The symposium will address the importance of native habitats, how invasive species harm these habitats, and why cooperative efforts are vital to understanding and managing our natural landscapes.
All who are interested in invasive plant issues are invited to attend. This symposium seeks to draw together municipal staff (parks and recreation, public works, inland wetlands/conservation commissions), nursery, tree and landscape professionals, educators, students, landscape architects, gardening enthusiasts, state and federal employees, members of conservation organizations and the public into a discussion of the challenges presented by invasive plants and how we can promote native plants by managing invasives.
The keynote speaker will be Dr. Bernd Blossey of Cornell University. Dr. Blossey's presentation is titled «The Power of Choice: New Frontiers in Invasive Plant Management and Conservation.» Concurrent afternoon sessions will include the industry perspective – what's working, early detection & rapid response; invasives management research; invaded forests; Cooperative Weed Management Areas and local success stories. Research posters and other educational exhibits will be featured throughout the day.
Pesticide recertification credits and a variety of other continuing education credits will be offered.
Early registration (postmarked by Sept. 18) is $40. The fee is $55 if postmarked after September 18 or for walk-in registrations. Student fee, with ID, is $25. Walk-in registrations only if space is available. The symposium program, registration form, and other information are available on the CIPWG website: http://www.hort.uconn.edu/cipwg
Please send registration and checks (payable to The University of Connecticut) to: Donna Ellis, University of Connecticut, Department of Plant Science & Landscape Architecture, 1390 Storrs Road, Unit 4163, Storrs, CT 06269-4163. Included in the cost of admission are an information packet, parking, lunch, snacks and beverages.
For more information, contact Donna Ellis at (860) 486-6448; email donna.ellis@uconn.edu.

Categories: Conferences/Shows, Invasives.
Tags: Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group, managing Connecticut's invasive plants, University of Connecticut.

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Make a difference. Plant natives.

joenesgarden — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 02:07:23 +0000

Garden as if life depended on it! Doug Tallamy wrote these words in my copy of his book, Bringing Nature Home. No, I'm not a special friend or acquaintance, he wrote similar, if not identical words inside all the books he signed that day. On the other hand, though, I am special. I'm a gardener with extraordinary power … I can choose to plant whatever I want. You are also extraordinary, as you have exactly the same power as I. And if we, as gardeners, do just a little of what Tallamy suggests – increase the number of native plants growing in each of our gardens– we, individually and together, may be able to make a significant difference in the nature of our future.

Professor Tallamy chairs the Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology at the University of Delaware in Newark. There he teaches insect taxonomy and ecology courses and researches how insects and plants interact. You can delve into his research simply by searching his name in Google Scholar. You'll see studies like Squash beetle feeding behavior in the journal Ecology, or Effects of non-native plants on the native insect community of Delaware in Biological Invasions … you get the picture, he's an insect junkie. But he's still able to write compelling, and very readable non-scientific explanations of the side-by-side evolution of local insects and local plants that enables them to support not only each other but the many birds and other creatures farther up the food chain … and how non-native plants are simply not as palatable or user-friendly, so to speak, to local insects … and when faced with fewer or no native food, insects either vastly decline or disappear … and when this happens local birds have fewer insects and caterpillars to feed their little bird babies … and weaker or fewer bird babies means fewer birds to feed other creatures farther up the food chain. Ok, any grammar or English teacher reading this is probably cringing at my run-on sentence, but I think I've made my, or more correctly Tallamy's point. Fewer natives = fewer bugs = fewer birds = less food for all.

Time and again Tallamy has found substantially more insect biomass (bird food) surviving on native shrubs, trees, and plants as opposed to alien greenery growing in the same area. One of his students, Meg Ballard, as her master's thesis, conducted a two-year comparison of insect biomass (bird food) found on six herbaceous natives – eastern black nightshade, black-eyed Susan, devil's beggarticks, ragweed, horseweed, and goldenrod – and six herbaceous aliens – lambsquarters, cocklebur, velvetleaf, jimsonweed, pigweed, and cosmos. Compared with aliens, the natives produced nearly 6-times more generalist insect herbivore biomass – that's science-speak for insects that eat just about any plant (generalists) rather than specialize on specific plants and therefore provide a good amount of bird food. This comparison produced no evidence that generalists prefer alien plants, Tallamy writes, or that alien plants produce as much insect biomass (bird food) as native plants.

Some of you are likely thinking, 'You want me to plant plants that attract more bugs?' The short answer is yes. More native plants = more native bugs = more bird food. An example is black-eyed Susans. They grow with virtually no work, offer color throughout mid to late summer, and provide food for local birds.

Tallamy's arguments for planting natives focuses more on trees. Consider oaks (Quercus), the mightiest when it comes to supporting Lepidoptera species (moths and butterflies). Oaks support 534, followed by willows (Salix) and cherry or plums (Prunus) at 456 each, birch (Betula) at 413, poplars/cottonwoods (Populus) at 368, and crabapples (Malus) at 311. Whereas beech (Fagus) support just 126. (Get the book and read the list on page 147.)

Bringing Nature Home includes color photos of native trees, native perennials, and native insects, as well as lists of natives for all regions of the continental U.S. – sorry Alaska, Hawaii, and other island locales - and this alone makes it a valuable reference. It also argues persuasively that gardeners move away from planting only for aesthetics and toward planting more to achieve a balanced food web. Tallamy even cites the success he and his wife have had in converting their own suburban yard from a lawn near-wasteland to a richly diverse insect-laden, bird-friendly, native-plant haven.

Humans have disrupted natural habitats in so many ways and in so many places, and this is increasingly evident in ever decreasing numbers of amphibians, butterflies, birds, and other creatures. But as gardeners and stewards of our land, we are empowered to reverse some of this disruption, simply by planting natives.

I, for one, plan to rise to Tallamy's challenge by planting more shrubs and perennials native to Connecticut. Check out the links below to learn how you can be so empowered as well.

Resources:

Connecticut Native Trees and Shrubs at A Garden of Possibilities.
Gardening with native plants, the Connecticut Botanical Society.
Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group
American Beauties, Native Plants
Dr. Doug Tallamy, University of Delaware – take some time to investigate all the links here.
Bringing Nature Home is available from Timber Press.

Categories: Gardening, On the Bookshelf.
Tags: A Garden of Possibilities, Bringing Nature Home, Connecticut Botanical Society, Connecticut Invasive Plant Working Group, Doug Tallamy, gardening in Connecticut, native plants, Timber Press.

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