Bring Back the Weeds

Rosepink (Sabatia angularis) is a summer roadside
annual whose presence is being sprayed away

The hand of man is heavy upon the land, and the need to exert control seems to be increasing. We’ve heard of the agricultural fields that have been sprayed into obedience thanks to using modified crops, but this control extends to residential and business landscapes as well.  

People want sweeps of shorn grasses and tidy edges where the grass meets a hard surface. The surfaces themselves must be blown clean of debris. The lawn and flower/shrub beds must be sprayed to control any intruding vegetation.

All of this behavior has taken a toll on insect life and the trophic levels in the food chain above them, including birds.

In plain English: We’re killing the things around us so that we can shape nature the way we want it.

The solution: Reduce our usage of herbicides, pesticides, and power equipment and make room for a little more native life in our landscapes.

• If we stopping using non-native plants in our landscape, particularly ones just valued for being an evergreen blob, we could support more native insects.
• If we stopping spraying pesticides and applying chemicals to our non-native outdoor carpets, also known as lawns, we’d have more native insects and underground critters/organisms to nourish the soil.
• If we stopped using leaf blowers as a casual device and a lazy substitute for brooms, we might have more insects and we’d definitely enjoy the outdoors more!
• And finally, if we stopping using herbicides and weed whackers to beat down the tiny wildflowers that were here way before we were … we would definitely have more insects. It’s time to bring back the weeds! 

Common violet (Viola sororia) in lawn

I should qualify that, of course, not all weeds are native and even some native plants could use a little control. The definition of ‘weed’ that I’m using here is "any plant that pops up and that humans feel must immediately be controlled."  From the tiny Geranium carolinianum in the lawn to the black cherry (Prunus serotina) seedlings next to the driveway, these things must go! I wish that humans were half that diligent about controlling Japanese stilt grass (Microstegium vimineum) and other non-native plants that just pop up.

There was an article circulating around recently about ‘plant blindness.’ While intended for a discussion about blindness to plants in general, it is definitely a problem about native plants. Most people don’t figure out what a plant is, if it is native, if it has a value in being here (over and above what it can do for their yard, that is). Today we have more resources than ever for figuring how what something is, so why don't we figure out what it is before blasting it to smithereens?

Geranium carolinianum

We should consider that we had some of our healthiest pollinator populations when we left a few ‘weeds’ around (many of which were native plants quietly trying to grow and bloom to feed the insects).

So put down the spray bottle and the ‘weed & feed’ treatments and start learning about these plants that were around long before we were. [And get rid of that opportunistic non-native plant that snuck in while you’re at it!]