Invasive Species Management

Invasive species are non-native plants and animals that aggressively displace native wildlife species. Invasive plant species often out-compete native wildflowers and other plants for space, light, or water. This can reduce diversity in affected areas to a low-quality habitat of a few invasive species.

In our park system Bush Honeysuckle, Autumn Olive, Tree of Heaven, and Garlic Mustard are the most dominant invasive pests. Our focus is on removing invasive species in areas that have existing native plant communities threatened by invasives.

Cur­rent meth­ods of inva­sive con­trol include cut­ting, pulling, and the use of her­bi­cides. Pulling Gar­lic Mus­tard is a great way to get large groups involved in inva­sive con­trol. It is impor­tant to note that the entire plant must be dis­posed of in the trash, burned, or buried deeply to keep seeds from germinating.

Woody inva­sives such as Bush Hon­ey­suckle, Autumn Olive, and Tree of Heaven often vig­or­ously re-sprout after being cut, which makes cut­ting alone unsuc­cess­ful at killing the plant. Expe­ri­ence indi­cates that the respon­si­ble use of her­bi­cide often plays an essen­tial role in remov­ing inva­sive plants.

To learn more about inva­sive species in our area, please visit the Ohio Inva­sive Plants Coun­cil Web­site at http://www.oipc.info

Vol­un­teer par­tic­i­pa­tion improves our abil­ity to fight inva­sives. If you are inter­ested in help­ing remove inva­sive plants from our parks, please contact:

Chris Roshon
Nat­ural Resources Tech­ni­cian
croshon@preservationparks.com
740–272-2903