Summer is well underway, gardening season is upon us, and Aquatic Invasive Species Outreach Specialist Jeanne Scherer is seeing her hard work pay off as her native plants in her home garden are flourishing.
“I have a little garden out in the front corner of my lawn that I put in about four years ago now, and I went out there to weed it, and it took me less than 10 minutes this year because the native plants in it have just exploded.” Jeanne said.
While native plants are those which have existed in an area historically, non native plants are ones that have not – they were introduced to an area by human activities, according to the National Audubon Society. However, non native plants are not necessarily harmful to the ecosystem. Invasive plants are specifically non native species that are harmful to the ecosystem. Aggressive plants outcompete other plants, and they can be native or non native.
With a team of Wisconsin DNR, Extension Lakes and Minnesota DNR, Scherer recently put together two resources about native replacements for invasive plants. This rounded out a trio, covering terrestrial flowers and grasses; wetland and aquatic plants; and trees, shrubs and vines. According to Scherer, the goal with this set was to provide people with concrete actions they can take against the invasives in their yards.
“People hear about invasive species all the time, and they want to throw up their hands and quit or they get so mad and they want to spray chemicals on everything or they freeze altogether,” Scherer said. “It’s just common reactions that people have when they’re scared. It’s fight or flight, you know?”
Instead of these unproductive “fight or flight” responses, Scherer hopes the informational resources will help people shift their efforts towards making positive changes.
“The impetus was: give people alternatives so they can take action.” Scherer said. “[We] are focusing on what people can do and how they can actually take some action, instead of just feeling like spraying chemicals or pulling their hair out.”
When it comes to invasive plants, there are two main categories – prohibited and restricted. When a species is a prohibited invasive species, the transport, possession, introduction and transfer of the species are all banned, according to the Wisconsin DNR. Restricted species are the same, except possession is allowed. As Scherer has seen in her own garden, planting native plants can prevent the spreading of aggressive invasive plants in your yard.
Scherer also cautioned gardeners against plants described as ones that can “fill in the area for you.” According to her, this type of descriptor can often indicate an aggressive plant that is likely to take over the landscape.
“Be wary, because it might fill in the area and beyond,” Scherer said. “It might just be a species that we’re not aware of yet, the DNR is not aware of yet, and all of a sudden it’s popping up, not just in your garden, but your neighbor’s yard and the woods next door.”
When researching plants you’re unsure of, it’s important to be diligent and search using the scientific name since plants often have many common names. This is especially true for cultivated species, but can be seen with native plants as well. Being careful and ensuring you know what you’re planting is crucial to keeping invasive species out of your garden.
“If you have no idea how it’s going to behave, you might want to think twice about planting it,” Scherer said.
As far as advice on what to do if you find an invasive plant in your garden?
“If you’re concerned about it, remove it,” Scherer said. “Most municipalities will let you take DNR advice to go ahead and bag it up in a plastic trash bag and put it in your trash.”
Some plants can also be composted, Scherer said, but only those that need an aquatic environment to survive.
“Plants that only grow in water will dry out and die on land,” Scherer said.
But, when it comes to wetland and terrestrial plants, composting is the opposite of what you should be doing.
“If it’s a wetland plant or a terrestrial plant, they should not be composted,” Scherer said. “Often the compost won’t get hot enough to actually kill those seeds, which is the goal of composting such a thing. Or they’ll be out on the periphery of your compost pile and that’s not going to get that heat. So you might just be giving it a really happy place to grow and put out more seeds or rhizomes.”
Gardening and landscaping are actually significant sources of invasive plants because of how easy it is to buy invasive plants unwittingly.
“It’s important for us to realize that an awful lot of our invasive wetland and terrestrial plants, especially, have come to us through our gardening efforts […] that we bring in because they’re beautiful,” Scherer said.
This can happen from in-person purchases at plant stores, though Scherer said it’s becoming much more difficult to find invasive plants there because of the work the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection has been doing to keep invasives out of stores. What’s more common nowadays is for invasive plants to be purchased online, where it’s up to the seller how careful they are about preventing the sale of invasive plants.
“Some online sellers will be very careful, and other ones will not be careful at all,” Scherer said. “Awareness, particularly when you’re looking for plants online, is really important.”
Additionally, Scherer cautions against sharing plants with friends, as that can have unintended consequences.
“Sometimes you have seeds or rhizomes in that plant material of something else besides your plant,” Scherer said. “If you raised it from seed or [clean, purchased root stock in a pot], that’s fine, but if you’ve dug it out of your yard, you’re risking moving disease, you’re risking moving jumping worms if you have them (whether you know it or not) and you’re risking accidentally getting seeds for some other species that could be potentially invasive.”
