Site Discussions

Virginia:

Other species of once (December 1969) recommended “wildlife plantings” (by the USDA Soil Conservation Service or “SCS”) were Tartarian and Amur Honeysuckle. I came across the pamplet (PA-940) while going through old files. As a retired USDA Forest Service biologist, I wonder how much of the “expert advice” we have given (like stocking various fishes all over the world) has had unintended deleterious consequences.

I have wonderfully vigorous stands of the tartarian honeysuckle and purple loosestrife on the farm here that the SCS cost-shared to plant and that NRCS is now cost-sharing with me to eradicate! I am engaged in trench warfare as (“Dr. Death” with the Roundup) each year. So far all I am able to accomplish (after about five years of pretty intense battles) is a modicum of control. I dont’ think eradication is feasible with current technologies!

Sincerely Sadder but Wiser,

Paul Brouha

My nemisis is oriental bittersweet. Since my teens I have been roaming forests from Pennsylvania to Maine clipping and yanking the cursed stuff. Once you get an eye for it, you will see it is almost everywhere, and no wonder, birds love it. So do some well meaning people who make decorative wreaths from berry laden stems. Unknowingly, they introduce the vine into their gardens and hedgerows. At that point, it can be easy to pull up and stop the spread, but most people are oblivious to the small plants. Once established, it is quite tedious to entirely remove. A job well beyond most gardeners’ attention spans or ability.

Clipping provides immediate gratification in the battle against the onslaught, but it sprouts right back from the stump and sends up shoots from the roots, which may range far from the stump. Occasionally, sawing a very old (40 years or so) specimen will blessedly kill it outright. Pulling the vine right out of the ground is effective, but backbreaking, as well as near impossible once the stem has become established. Herbicides work, but are beyond my means outside of a spot application.

To me, these vines are unsightly parasites, twisting, bending and strangling everything in their path. They may be an economic problem as well. A cut-over wood lot not far from mine may never regenerate into anything resembling a forest, as no tree or shrub can out compete this plague.

What invasive burdens are others bearing?

I have a Norway maple on my conscience.

(And a house loaded with windows that birds keep trying to fly through!)

Where can I find detailed directions on how to eradicate buckthorn, honeysuckle, and wild rose?  cjf

Virginia,

I go to great lengths to locate stands of Japanese knotweed so that I can pick it and eat it fresh and also use as the main ingredient in a wonderful chutney recipe.

I find that it spreads slowly when left alone, but when, say, the highway department renews a roadside ditch, the knotweed has a heyday.

Anyway, I figure knotweed needs an apologist and I seem to fit the bill…

Tom

Southwestern Michigan is over-run with the stuff. AND with garlic mustard.  AND with buckthorn. AND other invasives as well.

I have a large woodland farm, conservation easements all in possession of the Southwest Michigan Land Conservancy, and the garlic mustard may be more insidious and invidious than the autumn olive; soon the autumn olive will be blooming, and the sweetest perfume one can imagine will float down the hills on warm late spring evenings and invade our bedroom, and will be so lovely that one can momentarily, at least, think good thoughts about it.  But there is nothing good to think about garlic mustard: it supposedly can be eaten, but only once a year.  And one can make enough for two or three meals by pulling up maybe two plants.  And Roundup doesn’t work very well on it.  One’s perservance is not reward, and one’s age doesn’t stop advancing: pulling gets harder and harder as the years go by.  Each plant one misses spreads some 4000 seeds upon ripening, and those seeds are viable in the earth for up to seven years.  [Fire seems to offer some relief; or terrible drought.  Nothing else.  Nothing. Pulling only keeps it at bay.]

We have many deer on our property, and they don’t like the stuff any more than I do.

TCB

I bought a house with AO growing on it, they bought it for the turkeys. I spent 5 years cutting, hacking and mowing. When I sold the place, I warned the new owners about not letting it get out of control.

The people I bought the place from must have loved invasives; in addition to the AO they had cypress spurge, rosa rugosa, and burning bush. Not on the list but uncontrolled mint and tansy were growing in several gardens. They’re out there.

inoculated logs last spring. lots of mycilium showing on logs and bark splitting in spots. theres a few very small shrooms starting to pop. temps are in 60’s day,30’s night. what is the optimum temp. to force these logs to fruit. could i bring them inside after soaking?

“Whoever doesn’t like the smoke needs to move back to the city and inhale the smog there. Burning wood does not produce harmful gasses into the air.” 

Respectfully, did you take a close look at the Comparison chart up above?  Living in the vicinity of someone who heats with a poorly engineered or improperly operated wood burner can quickly turn your life into pure misery.  There’s not just the persistent stink, which can’t be kept out of the most tightly sealed house; for many people—such as adults and children with asthma, older people with cardiovascular issues, etc—there can be very serious health consequences. 

In my suburban area of Northwest Indiana, the uncontrolled spread of wood burners is becoming an epidemic.  There’s little or no regulation.  I’ll probably soon be driven out of the area I’ve lived in for 35 years, because it’s hard for someone with asthma to live all winter under a ground-hugging blanked of air pollution. 

Why would anyone think they have a right to foul the air above everyone else’s property line?

Just a note to say that ticks are active for longer periods than some information suggests. We have found ticks on people and dogs every month of the year except January and February. The dogs get ticks in a fenced and mowed yard. There are mole and shrews in evidence. Perhaps those critters are the source.

‘Only eight [...] walkingstick species are found in North America.’ Actually, it’s about 30.

Growing up in Orange, Vermont, back in the 50’s, I took an early interest in the birds.  This was due in part to having a father that taught me at an early age the names of some of the birds that shared the farm with us.  For several years I kept a written record of what day in the spring the earliest birds reappeared after a long winter.  Interestingly the red-winged blackbirds arrived within 2 to 3 days of the same date each year - between the 3rd and 5th of March, regardless of the weather.

You captured the feel of spring with great accuracy…up north I did get one more run of some really rich syrup making on Good Friday…but then I pulled my taps.  It was 85 degrees and it just isn’t that much fun hanging out around a fire.  Guess that’s what the moose thought too, the one who left tracks right up to one of my buckets and knocked it down, pulling tap and all out of the tree.  Moose and I are ready for spring beauties and trout lilies, i guess.

Lovely essay. Captures the sense of things just right.

Except for one detail: 4 months of winter? Not in these parts! Even though it was light compared to other winters, I count six!

Hi Dave: Just want to comment on your Psoriasis of Spring. I really enjoy your vivid analogies of this year’s spring or rather pre-spring.
It seems particularly true this year because of the early departure of snow, especailly in the fields, before the earth was prepared to reveal herself. Thank you for sharing some of those raw feelings of Spring.
I enjoy all the articles and editorials on the e-edition of Northern Woodlands. I always enjoy Bryan Pfieffer’s articles. He writes just like himself. Through his written words, I can picture him telling us about the male ruby-crowned kinglet (with “weak knees”) or pointing out a Bryant’s goose among the hundreds of snow geese at Dead Creek.

I am sending you an April poem by separate email.
      I hope you enjoy every facet of Spring, Ann Day

I aplogize for the length of this commnet.

Nice piece, Dave Mance. Yes winter is long and brutal and hardest part comes at the end; darkest before the dawn. Emerging from a car wreck analogy is apt… We emerge cautiously, squinting in bright light (is that sun?) while wondering if its safe now to smile. Each season has its moods. You captured this one perfectly.

I call your perspective “Yankee Gothic.“But like they say: “Could be worse!” I love winter for its own unique beauties, but I’ll take April’s hope to November’s ominous dread any day!

How much is it to buy black birch wood for use?

What was unexpected was the amount of deca-BDE in the falcon eggs. Although total PBDE remained steady over the 10-year study, concentrations of deca-BDE, once thought to be too big a molecule to cross cell membranes, appear to be doubling in falcon eggs every five years. Deca-BDE remains the major PBDE in production worldwide. liver enzymes

the air space inside a maple tree is what makes sap flow possible; most other trees don’t have the same internal arrangement, so they don’t “run.”

this air space also keeps a maple from exploding, by allowing space for ice to form. it’s kind of like when you freeze a half gallon of cider in the fall: if you freeze it full, it’ll blow up, but if you pour off enough to leave sufficient air space, everything shines on.

of course i only have a sugarmaker’s understanding of it all. any of the maple scientists at either the University of Vermont or Cornell could give more indepth answers.

Commendable and readable essay by C.W.. As to the question posed by Jim, I don’t have an answer, just some thoughts. I haven’t seen what a mulcher leaves behind, but landscape mulch, such as shredded hemlock, suppresses plant growth, be it trees or grass. Slash itself is a form of mulch, and it suppresses plant growth as well. In my anecdotal view, the forest floor after logging operations is inundated with duff-drying sunlight and overwhelmed with highly acidic decomposing needles, the combination of which prevents much regeneration for a number of years. So, you may not have to do anything much to maintain your forest opening for several years. If you are looking for a pasture or lawn-like effect, you may have to rototill and plant grass. This may be difficult due to rocks and residual stumps and roots. Oddly, this method could work against you as grass would be the perfect seed bed for regenerating pine, which means that unless you are going to mow or have grazing animals, the forest could return with a vengeance.