ARTICLES :: Invasive Plants Aug 2009

Invasive Plants

By:  Melinda Sperl

I love Passion Vine and Honeysuckle and would love to plant them everywhere.  But did you know that these are considered invasive plants? Trumpet vine is very much my nemesis as it not only spreads by seed, it will trail underground and come up in your grass where no amount of weed killer can catch it.  And we all know about Katie Ruellia, plant it in one bed and it comes up in all your beds.  

It is unheard of now to plants a Chinese Tallow but many years ago people loved them!   Banana trees spread like crazy under fences where it was never wanted but we keep buying them.  Bamboo has been the result of many law suits between neighbors as it invades and is extremely hard to control but it is still sold.  One plant sold for small household aquariums, Hydrilla, has cost taxpayers millions to clean out of our public lakes.  These are all invasive plants yet are still sold.

An invasive plant is one that once planted, spreads on its own by seed or root.  That sounds harmless enough and is even good in grasses when we want them to fill in quick.  But the bad part about this is that our native plants are being over run with non-native, invasive plants.  Our forests are being smothered by vines brought in to homes.  Of course, if we looked too closely at this we would never plant Salvia as these are even considered invasive.

 Most of these plants can be easily controlled though.  Katie’s come up in another bed you just pull them out before they’re grown.  Your vine grows over the neighbors fence you trim it.   But others are  harder and consideration should be taken before planting it.

To find a list of invasive plants for your area go  to www.invasivespeciesinfo.gove or www.texasinvasives.org. 

Happy Gardening!

Melinda Sperl is the owner of Dream Landscape Design, Inc., a full service landscape company.  You can reach Melinda at Melinda@dreamlandscapedesign.com or www.dreamlandscapedesign.com