(Aozotorp) wrote in message ...
Yet it is being promoted like mad by the Plant sellers!

Problem:

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ed...=Searc h+News

Local Plants are the best:

http://www.pennlive.com/newsflash/pa.../1079902477439
80.xml

Headline:

Pennsylvania News

Environmental and government groups tell gardeners to go native


The Associated Press
3/21/2004, 3:55 p.m. ET


READING, Pa. (AP) â€" Environmental and government groups have a message for
gardeners: Go native.


Nonnative plants in a back yard or flower bed may look lovely, like purple
loosestrife, or smell divine, like the honeysuckle vine, but they can choke out
wildflowers and other plants that are native to the area, said Susan Munch, an
Albright College associate biology professor.

"These are very aggressive plants. They grow very fast, put up leaves very
early in spring and grow so close together there's no room for others to grow,"
Munch told about 30 people at a workshop organized by the Pike Oley District
Preservation Coalition.

Some of the infiltrating plants came as seeds accidentally stowed in cargo in
ships arriving from Europe or attached to the fur of imported animals. In other
cases, conservancy and government groups intentionally developed and planted
the invasive species, Munch said.

For example, state and federal transportation departments planted the crown
vetch to hold soil along roads. The plan worked, but the invasive plant quickly
spread into surrounding woods, Munch said.

"The government wasn't well educated until very recently," she said.

Munch said the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources now is
working to educate people.

Awareness of invasive plants is crucial to keep gardeners from unintentionally
spreading the problem by sowing the seeds of invasive plants, said Phoebe L.
Hopkins, a member of Pike Oley group.

"Lots of times you order these things unknowingly" because plant catalogs don't
always identify plants as nonnative, Hopkins said.

Exeter Township resident Jim F. Houston said he recognized many of the plants
Munch described because he has been battling them in his own back yard.
Oriental bittersweet has been pulling down his trees and purple loosestrife has
been cropping up everywhere, he said.
-----------------

Butterfly Bush labeled an invasive:

http://www.invasive.org/eastern/midatlantic/budd.html

http://www.lebanon-express.com/artic...ine/news13.txt

http://www2.kval.com/x30530.xml?Pare...44478&Lay out
=kval.xsl&AdGroupID=x30530



Yet it is being promoted like Mad:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...uy+butterfly+b
ush&btnG=Google+Search

http://springhillnursery.com/search....+bush&x=12&y=3


Unfortunately, the webpages describing butterfly bush as an invasive
species contradict each other. The Lebanon Express webpage states that
some butterfly bush cultivars do not appear to be invasive. These
noninvasive cultivars should be identified so gardeners have safe
choices. The native substitutes for butterfly bush are not all good
replacements. Butterfly weed is a short herbaceous perennial so is
hardly a substitute for a tall shrub like butterfly bush.

In many areas in the Eastern U.S. deer overpopulation probably causes
more damage to native vegetation than invasive plants.

http://pa.audubon.org/Deerfactsheetrev1.htm

Unfortunately, government officials don't have the guts to stand up to
the many "Bambi-lovers" opposed to thinning the herds.

Invasive garden plants are certainly a problem but there doesn't seem
be much government leadership on wider use of native plants. It is
rather ironic that the U.S. Botanic Gardens and the National Arboretum
both feature mainly nonnative plants.

One American company is selling memorial trees, yet most are foreign
species such as Austrian pine, Japanese maple, ginkgo, Deodara cedar
and Chinese dogwood.
http://www.thoughtfulexpressionsbyma...146/239005.htm

Ironically, even some of the American Forests historic trees are not
American species, including Clara Barton kousa dogwood, Harry S.
Truman gingko, James Madison's Montpelier English oak and John
Bartrum's golden rain tree. What better way to remember John Bartrum
as "Father of American Botany" than with a foreign tree species?

http://www.historictrees.org/home.asp

If federal or state governments wanted to demonstrate leadership in
the area of invasive ornamental plants, they would require that all
new trees and shrubs used to landscape government properties are U.S.
natives. American native plants don't get much respect in the USA, and
planting native plants is not widely considered patriotic. Europeans
often seem to appreciate American flora more than Americans. The
annual Washington D.C. Japanese cherry blossom festival is a good
example. An equally spectacular display could be had with American
native trees such as dogwoods and redbuds.