disturbing news for US gardeners

I'm just back from an excellent RHS talk on medicinal plants in the garden. The questions at the end included one of invasive plants from abroad.

Did you know it costs the US government 8,000 million a year to tackle invasive non native plants? They are trying to bring in a new law which will make all gardeners grow ONLY native plants and destroy non native plants

So, there will be no more daylilies in the USA?

What about invasive natives?

And what is 8,000 million?

8,000 million is 8 billion, but I have seen $100 billion quoted. Our San Francisco Bay is one,of many, victims to invasive species of plants and animals.

Caulerpa taxifolia was introduced to the Mediterranean by the Oceanographic Museum in Monaco (founded by Jacques Cousteau.) It has grown from 1 square yard in 1984 to something that may choke all other life out of the Mediterranean. http://www.outriderbooks.com/ot4.html
The U.S. is not the only nation plagued by this problem.

Here Here george,I watched a special on the Mediterranean problem,I also have seen the Kudzu problem in the south.Sure does make you think,this problem has gone on for ages.

they were taking $US

I have a question about this invasive plant issue. Why don't they just use a good herbicide on the stuff? Or are they so tunnel visioned that they insist on death over survival if they can't be organic to the extreme?

It would create a huge black market for plants. Imagine, people would be stealing stereos out of cars to sell, cause there would be a ship coming into the harbor full of daylilies.
I know, it really is a big problem in lots of places.

I'm sure 8 billion is more like it. And that is an enormous sum. Some countries don't have that much in their total budget. I don't think daylillies could be considered invasive and may strains have been hybridized in the US anyway. I hope they don't get completely crazy with this..

Does this mean no more oranges, apples, tomatoes, cabbages, carrots, cauliflower, peas, corn, radishes, lettuce, pears, peaches, cherries, peppers, watermelon, onions, garlic, hybrid tea roses, bearded irises, daffodils, begonias, hollyhocks, and hostas? (No, corn is not native to what is now the United States. It was domesticated in what is now Mexico.)

Now, there are some invasive plants that I don't think should be sold, at least in certain parts of the country. Pampas grass is a big problem in California. The definition of native needs to be further explained also. A California redwood is as "exotic" as a Japanese maple where I live.

Well, my thought is they are gonna have a heck of a time enforcing that in my personal gardens! LOL, they gotta find me first!

This is a carry over or continuation of the attempt to create a "White List" It is a serious problem that needs a serious solution but I do not believe this type of control is going to be any more effective than the current "blacklist" and will be even more impossible to inforce wasting more funds (tax money) in implimentation and enforcement than it would cost to go out and hand dig every invasive plant in the country.

I wouldn't get all worked up over this.
The nurseries and horticulturists will fight this tool and nail. These type of rumors always get blown way out of portporation.

Paul

I too would not have a great concern. Most of the introductions are accidental importation on ships and planes. I can see more regulation there, but I doubt any of us will be limited any more than we are now. e.g. I live in California and we have some of the tightest restrictions around. Every time I go to Nevada to gamble, I have to submit my car to inspection at the Ag station on the way home. I feel it is a few minutes well spent.

Hernando County in FL passed a law prohibiting the residents in that fair venue from, not only not propagating, but indeed risking to become criminals if they failed to eradicate the Brazilian pepper plant in the area. This idiocy has been the subject of one or two humerous conversations, but otherwise was and is completely ignored. The proper response to such nonsense...ignore it and SURELY it will go away!

As best I can tell, this is the same government that introduced Melaleuca trees and Kudzu to the southern U.S. Bless their hearts, but what makes them think they've suddenly grown smart enough to tell home gardeners what we can and can't grow?

This is a continuation of the White List scare, and while I think we should take the matter quite seriously, I certainly don't sympathize with the government's position. Every hair on my head bristles when my dear ole government gets a notion to to spend a bunch more of the taxpayers' money to "help us". I can do without that kind of help, thank you very much.

well heres my two cents worth on this.

first off someone above asked the question why dont they use good herbicide on this stuff? let say this on some of this its great to do. but like our dreaded kudzu it doesnt work. its about like medicine. over time it gets immune. this vine was brought here to control erosion issues in the south. well it worked and then some. no one knew our condition were ideal for this vine. some dont know that this vine in right conditions is able to grow up to 7 ft a day. yes i said 7ft a day. a university here has been doing studies on this plant. the problem is no matter what is done to it it comes back. i see all the time where things are set on fire to elimate this plant. a couple months later its back like nothing ever happened. my fellow southerners can attest to this.. the intent with this plant was good but the outcome is bad.

now as other invasive things. our gardens are our own. the gov is not gonna come to everyones door. to me its talk to get peoples attention and to be careful. yes some stuff is very invasive. you have to use caution. thats with every thing though.

i will give you a plant that runs wild no matter what you try to do to it. mint. if you miss one little piece you will have more. but i havent seen this on any list yet. if it is i missed it or wasnt looking in the right spot.

you have to be your own judge and jury on the plants you grow. the government is making us aware of whats out there and whats wrong. i might be looking at this wrong but i sincerly dont believe there are going to be garden police at my door because i am growing something invasive. i know what i need to do and i am responsible for it if it gets out of hand. they want you to be aware.

if we didnt have laws and restrictions we would not be where we are at today. i agree that the govenment needs to focus on other things besides plants but they do have good points too. they dont want another kudzu problem.

its us as plant enthusists too care for our plants and our space. i am not saying ignore what the gov is saying. but read it with a grain of salt. they are trying to get our attention which they have. i dont take everything seriously but i understand what they are saying.

okay last point then wil get off my soap box.

we all hate customs but they are there for a reason. no customs a bad fruit bug comes in the states. gets loose. the consequences of this i dont even want to think about.

take things with aq grain of salt but also listen to them they have some points. please know they are not always right. most of the time keep everything in a mess but they do do good things too.

okay i put a dollars worth here. imzadi

I do not mind the banning of known invasive plants in my area.

I do resent the fact that the same people who want to tell me what I may or may not plant have a history of planting things without testing them first and then blaming the home gardener for it all. In the South it is Kudzu. Here it is Broom and pampas grass that were planted along the highways during Ladybird Johnson's "Beautify America" campaign. And in almost any area of the country you can find similar invasions that can be directly attributed to taxpayers dollars used ill advisedly by our government.

The migration of other invasive species has happened through ships as stated above and they are forever trying to release non native insects to control other insects only to discover that the solution often becomes a larger problem.

And because plants and animals have been introduced into most parts of the planet that were not native to the degree that we would need to denude most of the planet and start from scratch to set things back to the way the were the whole principle of "native species only" is ludicrus.

I do believe we should use natives as much as is practical but like most things it should be approached in moderation and not taken to extremes.


This message was edited Jul 10, 2005 2:36 PM

I can see it now - the men in Black are here to spray my 25 yr old Japanese Laceleaf Maple Dicectum tree!! I saw one just like it at a local nursey for $4,500.00!!!! It's not invasive, but it sure isn't native!

Zany, I agree that I do not want the MIB in my yard, but unknowing gardeners have planted things like pampas grass that can float over the fence and take out a canyon. All of ius on the west coast can take pictures of a beautiful canyon full of the stuff that drifted over because someone put it up for noise reduction on a fenceline. The stuff needs to go. It has to start at the nursery level though. As long as they sell they invasive plants, someone who thinks they are pretty will buy them.

The Ca delta is choked with water plants because people dumped fish tanks and extras from their ponds into the sloughs. It is hard to protect against ignorance.

Lets face it. If you live in CA and you have a garden, chances are it isn't native. Chollas and manzanita and the occasional scrub oak do not a garden make.

Oh, but you can become so attached to Cholla. I had one in my ankle once.

Don't forget ocatilla (sp) They throw themselves at you!

nobody is getting my daylilies-NOPE NOPE NOPE

Uncle Sam's never been very good at solving problems, LOL, but we gardeners can help. First find out if there's anything invasive in your own area. County extensions might be able to provide information. The Adirondack Mts. has a few, but many others are not invasive here because of the climate or conditions. Second we can be observant. If you notice any bugs chewing on an invasive plant, or see any that look like they might have a disease, try to get a picture or a sample and report it to your county or your state. See any areas where the spreading stops cold? Maybe a soil sample would be a good idea. With many eyes looking, we may find that these plants have developed a few enemies. Earwigs have chewed on nearly everything in my garden this year. Maybe they'd consider a change of cuisine... (Lord, don't I wish!) Seriously, though, we might find common sense solutions the MIB have overlooked.
PS They will NEVER get my beloved hyacinth! What "illegal aliens" will YOU be harboring, LOL?

There are a lot of extreme opinions being voiced here. Addressing some points:

No, we don't all need to switch to natives only, primarily because the experts know that biological invasives are NOT exclusively exotics. When overplanted, certain natives can become invasive as well. The picture is much bigger & infinitely more complex than just eliminating non-native plants in our gardens.

What we CAN do is pay attention to those plants that make the lists of environmental invasives or potential invasives and limit or eliminate our usage of those plants. This would be far easier, of course, if the various agencies that gather & study this info would actually distribute it to us in an easy-to-find format. But they're working on that. My own state has a card deck of the most impactful plants that they distribute in many locations (garden shows, the ext offices, etc). Steps like these make a difference. Every state has an invasive species or noxious weeds plant list on the web. Some are easier to find than others, but I've been trying to educate people about biological invasives for a number of years & I've found each & every state's list at some point or another. It's easy enough to bookmark your state's page & update yourself periodically to the problem plants in your own local area.

BTW, it's nobody's right to do things that damage the environment, and when we KNOW BETTER (because someone on a forum or such is informing us) then it makes sense that we should make the right decisions, and not just get our backs up about what we should & should not be able to grow in our gardens. Do you litter? Why not? Do you recycle? Why? If you make responsible decisions concerning these issues, why would you be so opposed to making responsible decisions concerning plants that are doing extreme damage to the environment?

These agencies & organizations are not blaming home gardeners, they're trying to educate us, and to enlist our help. They trust us to be interested in making the right decision concerning growing plants that are harmful to the environment, once they've provided us with the information we need.

Getting back to the original point -- no, we don't need to eliminate exotics in our gardens. But we do need to listen reasonably when we learn about the potential (or very real) invasive qualities of plants we are growing or would like to grow. This is not about who can tell you what to do, but about being a responsible individual and a responsible gardener.

I agree with most of your points Rubystar and you are correct that we as gardeners need to be cautious about what we plant and where we plant it BUT the whole idea of a so called White list is that a plant would need to be on the list bfore it could be bought, sold, imported, or exported and that any plants found on your property that are not approved could be ordered to be destroyed or penalties could be incurred.

As with any such far reaching law it would be impossible to enforce and would cause severe problems in the areas that tried to enforce it. Imagine an over eager inspector or one with a chip on his shoulder coming into gardens and ordering you to destroy plants you have had for years because it has not yet been cleared and added to the White list. The plants need not be invasive for the inspector to order their destruction. They only need to be not yet certified. Should you refuse you could be cited and the plants confiscated.

After years of forms and tests and legal hoops to jump through you might get the plant onto the list and be able to replace it but in the meantime it would be considered as illegal as Marijuana to grow it. Of course not all inspectors would take that approach but the law would be with the ones that did.

As a responsible gardener I would not plant known invasive plants in areas where they could not be totally controlled. Some plants such as scotch broom or pampas grass cannot be controlled since they spread by seeds carried by birds, animals and humans so I would never think of deliberately planting them here and have spent a lot of time and effort to remove them when they spring up on my property. Nor would I plant purple loosetrife or vinca major knowing as I do the harm they cause.

However I would only plant pink knotweed in a pot on a concrete patio where it can be contained safely even though it is not banned in my area knowing it could easily become invasive. Nor would I throw the cuttings into the compost heap or along the roadways where it could easliy root and take over. Yet I have seen it planted by crews along the road to act as erosion control! As a result I have little doubt that this plant will eventually be listed as invasive and it's sale or use banned.

The idea of more education is good but the idea of a white list is, in my opinion, ill concieved and should not be allowed to happen.

This message was edited Jul 10, 2005 2:35 PM

Zany, the main reason that the scenario you suggest doesn't worry me is because half of all houses or businesses nowadays have a garden & no govt agency I know of can afford to send inspectors to all of them. I mean, there are enough people who continue to grow (and even some businesses who sell) plants on the banned invasives lists (purple loosestrife is the biggie that people refuse to be intelligent about) and they don't have some black-clothed squad in jumpboots descending upon them (unfortunately). There certainly aren't even any inspectors going around checking every garden to fine people for growing plants on the banned lists.

I've read the NISC's page on the white list, and I don't find it to be even remotely as inflamatory as the "no white list coalition" suggests. Part of the process of controlling invasives in this country (and thus using our taxpayer dollars more wisely) is to have a more careful approach about how we import and even about what we grow. You yourself do. You're willing to take measures & make sacrifices to ensure that you don't contribute to the problem. Is this unreasonable? No, of course not. Is it illogical for the govt to do the same? No, it's high time they did. They themselves (or the various state agencies, acting individually) have contributed to a lot of the problems! Erosion control, as you mentioned. Organisms introduced to control a local problem that then impact the ornamentals industry (rose rosette disease). Federal regulations would also work to prohibit the various state agencies from acting hastily to control a problem and thus creating another problem.

The NWLC suggests that the NISC is being deceptive by using the term "risk analysis." But isn't that the logical way to approach potential invasives? Isn't that what you & I do already? We determine the risk we would be taking and act appropriately. Of course, the reason that the govt has to enact policies about risk analysis is because most people are NOT like you & I. They're more interested in serving their own purposes & are not concerned about the environment or responsible gardening.

I would say that while I'm not interested in having the govt regulate every inch of my garden, I recognize that that is not what is actually going on here. Not only is such a thing beyond their scope, it is also not at all what they're intent upon doing. The NWLC has turned a very reasonable attempt to get some control over the very real problems with invasives in our country into a botanical & biological witch hunt. I have to say I believe that if we were all able to regulate ourselves in the first place it probably wouldn't feel like that.

Which is more problematic, invasive plants or intrusive government? They both grow where You don't want them.

one great thing about kudzu tho....

goats and sheep love it and their feet tend to split the rootstock.
I'd pay a fair amount to see a bunch of Goats in suburban Atlanta.

drew

Speaking of invasive plants, here is the link to Center for Invasive Plant Management if anyone is interested http://www.weedcenter.org/index.html

Wow!. They wish to "increase interdisciplinary communication". Well YEE HA! Can we include Interstellar potentialities within these confines OR WHAT?

But the point is, that although they state it is not their intention to act like plant gestapo, this law wuld give them the power and authority to do just that. And anytime you give government more power there will be those who seek to exploit that power. Why not put all that authority to work on the existing Black lists? Expand the lists and enforce them more efficiently? The same research will need to be done to ban a plant either way. Money spent to educate is better than money spent to halt progress and limit our freedoms.

I must say I'm enjoying all of your comments

LOL Mark! Are they or have they tried anything like this in Northern Ireland?

But you are right, this is one of the most interesting discussions I have encountered here in a while.


Sqwidgetz that is a very handy link. Thanks!

DeepRoots, goats are currently being used in many areas to control brush and even our highway department is beginning to use them as an alternative to herbacides in some areas. But I don't know if Atlantas Suberbia is ready for that ;~)

kikisdad ! That is a hoot!

Can we give you your grey squirrels back please ;-)


Wintermoor

Only if we can send your snails back. ;-}

Zany, I understand your concerns. But the black lists have been around for some time, and they only do so much good. I mean, we both know they're barely enforceable, in terms of home gardeners anyway. They depend largely upon the integrity of individuals, and believe me, I'm astounded by how beligerant people can be about being "told what they can and cannot plant." So, rather than this issue being about what is good for the environment, it is instead about rights and freedoms.

Regardless, I do agree 100% that more money should be put into education & control efforts of blacklisted plants. And yes, kikisdad, increasing multidisciplinary communication is a good thing. I'd much rather have the various govt agencies communicating -- something they are notoriously bad at -- and can only laud them for such efforts, not mock them.

But I genuinely believe that the concern about white lists is being blown totally out of proportion. Do you really believe that an invasive species council is solely interested in using their money & spending their time & energy simply to take freedoms from us? That doesn't make sense to me. Of course, as always, if you have specific details about how the white list has impacted you or other home gardeners, I'm very interested in hearing about them. But I've not yet heard any proof, as it were, just concern about perceived controls.

I'm not sure if you were just being sarcastic, but I too am glad for the discussion. It is always better to be thinking & talking about these issues, I think. Even when our opinions differ.

: )

The first plant ban that I have read about in U.S. history is one enacted in Washington DC to eliminate the Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus). That was in about 1800. And it sure did work! LOL

No matter what laws man puts on his book, the desire for life to grow is greater.

Mark, I read with extreme interest articles written in the late 1980's and into the 1990's about a proposed system similar to the White List for use in England. Not only would it cover what plant species were allowed to be bought and sold and grown all over UK, it also included what cultivars would be allowed. Permission would have to be sought and obtained on a plant by plant basis. What ever happened about this? Sorry, I have read so many books, magazines and journals through the years that I have no clue where I first started hearing of this; I just know that it was the talk for a while. I don't even know if it was true.

Rubystar, I was not being sarcastic. This is an interesting discussion and the different opinions are informative and welcome.

That the black list is not enforced or utilized to it's maximum potential is very true. But to take it from one extreme to another will not necessarily make it better or more enforcible.

Since it has not yet been enacted it would be impossible to give examples of its impact upon us but we can extrapolate best case and worse case scenarios.

To me the proposed White list concept is one that will be cumbersome, and although it will be no easier to enforce than the blacklist it will be able to impact us to a much greater and less desireable manner. The funding to maintain and update it would be a huge burden and that money couldd better serve us if used to educate people and research controls for the problems we already have and to research plants that should be added to the blacklists.

Under the current uninforced laws, a plant can be confiscated or destroyed and penalties levied on plants that are on the invasive lists. Under a White List program, any plant that has not yet made it onto the list could be treated in that manner. Since it could take years or even decades to clear and list even the common plant species that could mean that a new plant could take decades to be approved. In the meantime you would be limited to growing only those few things that had already been researched and every other plant would need to be destroyed or you would be breaking the law. Whether that law is enforced or not does not alter the fact that many of our plants would be contraband until they made the list.

To make an analogy, it is like saying our system of justice often fails so lets reverse the process. In the future all people accused will be considered guilty until proven innocent in order to be certain no criminals can escape justice. Rather than innocent until proven guilty so no innocent party will be punished. ie: all plants will be banned until proven harmless versus all plants will be allowed until proven harmful.

To further complicate the process, this list would be federal. It would override state laws and a plant that is invasive in one area could be banned in all areas.

I am not advocating that the invasive plant laws be revoked or that each individual has the right to plant anything they want without regard to consequences but that this White list idea is not the way I feel we can obtain a fair and effective balance.

This message was edited Sep 29, 2003 5:38 PM

Well said George!! But don't you have bigger snails than we have rats in Europe ... what about the banana snails in the Pacific coast of the U.S.of A. ... they could probably scare a cat away ... Oh wait a minute, could you send me a couple of those 'cos there is a cat which uses my wee beds as a toilet, and when one of those banana snails growls at him .. well, end of cat ... yippeeeyaaaeee ... oops!! I must get a box of that EscarGo !! .. oh well ... you win some, you lose some !!!

In Germany, there was an outcry about 10 years ago when the Agriculture Minister decided to get rid of Blue Pine Trees, which were not endemic to Germany but to the U.S.ofA (brought over by servicemen and families, then planted in forests) ... He was ridiculed for this statement and his demand was overruled. Now the foresters are spending a lot of time pulling the Blue Pine saplings, out of the ground, since they spread much faster than a European Pine.

Well Whoodathunkit


Wintermoor

p.s. I would still prefer if you took the grey squirrels back home ... honestly.

Wintermoor, I can look up a recipe for squirell that might help you rid yourself of those pesky imported rodents...