Nature's Edge - Do you have ALIENS in your yard? - April 2008

Early spring is the best time of year to check your property for ALIEN invasive plants. Alien invasive plants are often the first plants to leaf out in the spring. This often provides them an advantage over our native plants. Once these plants leaf out they crowd out our native plants and produce chemicals that will keep our native plants from growing. It is important to get rid of these plants in order to provide a healthy growing environment for your native plants and trees.

Garlic Mustard is a biennial plant that produces a rosette the first year and flowers producing seed the second year. If you can catch it in the rosette stage the first year, you have practically won the battle! An excellent picture of a Garlic Mustard rosette and great information on controlling the plant can be found on the National Park Service website. Since Garlic Mustard is one of the first things to green up in the spring, you can simply pull it up (you must get all of the roots) or herbicide it. Local hardware and garden stores carry a wide variety of herbicides which can kill this plant. Be careful not to get the herbicide on plants that you don’t want to kill and be careful not to spray the herbicide on days when there is a wind that can carry the small spray particles to plants you do not want to damage or kill.

Another plant that will leaf out quickly in the spring is Buckthorn. This is a woody plant that grows into a small tree or shrub. (For a good picture and description of this invasive plant please visit the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources website. Small plants that are less than a few feet tall can be hand pulled or herbicided in the spring after their leaves have opened. Look for herbicides at the hardware or garden store that are specifically for "brush" or "woody" plants. Again, be careful not to spray herbicide on plants you do not want to kill and to consider weather conditions prior to applying the herbicide.

Taller buckthorn shrubs or trees are best managed in the late summer or early fall. This is because fuel for the plant is moving up through the trunk to the leaves in the spring. Larger plants are harder to kill, and it is best to herbicide these plants when the fuel is going to the roots in late summer and early fall. Keep in mind, the Village will be hosting another brush collection event in the fall. You can plan ahead to cut and herbicide the cut stump of the buckthorn in late summer and early fall and stack the brush in a pile to be moved to your curb for the brush collection event.

If you would like help identifying either of these plants, please call the Village at 847-883-8600. Village staff would be happy to meet with you to show you what the plants look like and to discuss further with you ways these invasive plants can be controlled.