Editor,
Being that plants are vital, and we would all perish without them, it’s interesting to observe what is going on in their realm. Though members of the plant kingdom do not speak, they do retreat, decline, advance, hog the road, invade, perish, shelter, protect, nourish, wilt, bloom, grow, wither, perfume, rot, decay and disappear just like humans do. So we have to watch with our eyes and let them do the talking.
What are they saying? I have been watching: In our subdivision in the Ozarks, a hop away from Eureka Springs, colonizing sericea lespedeza and Sorghum halepense [Johnson grass] smash, smother and crush native ephemerals and other Ozark specialties, like Widow’s cross, Sweet William and rose verbena. These delicate wonders do not have a fighting chance so they decline and disappear.
Mighty oaks are being replaced in new housing developments with non-native trees of various kinds – forsythia, burning bush and Korean boxwoods. Each of these choices by developers or homeowners is a climate change matter. Why? Because native plant colonies or groupings create a finely-tuned food web, floral and faunal connections, companionship, and opportunities for life. Sterile patches being placed together without regard to native ecology are contributing to climate change bit by bit.
I won’t apologize for saying that English Ivy, Euonymus fortunei, Japanese honeysuckle are ugly wherever they are smothering a native tree or invading whether it be a yard, city block or country property. I will apologize for not explaining myself earlier as I have been very busy growing thousands of Ozark natives in the greenhouses at Forest Park in St. Louis and working with the University of Missouri in St. Louis in developing a sustainable landscape on their campus. Sometimes we have to watch what people do and not just what they say in a moment of exasperation.
I am proud that the 10,000 plants we propagated in Forest Park greenhouses will be distributed all across the state of Missouri in Monarch way stations. Please watch what plants are doing to each other, especially when they are not living harmoniously, with one vine suffocating a whole tree to death.
One single tree does not symbolize biodiversity or a forest, and one tree covered in invasive plant material from another continent shows climate change is here to stay unless we act to change things.
Susan Pang, Garfield, Ark.