Localite: Out With the Invasives

My husband has waged war on honeysuckle. Exactly when this plant species was brought to the United States is unknown. It may have been 1906 or as early as 1806. What’s not to love, people must have thought. A fast-growing shrub with abundant flowers and a sweet smell. So benign, in fact, that children can pluck the green tip from the blossom, slowly pull out the stem and then suck the dollop of nectar that awaits at the end. I did this for hours as a child. I loved honeysuckle. Now, it is the bane of our existence.

Getting rid of honeysuckle requires an assortment of tools: a chainsaw, sweat and something called a Pullerbear, if you really want to be effective. You order the Pullerbear from a family in Canada, and it’s such a prized item that they will weld your name on it for free. You then use the Pullerbear to dig out the stump and root ball of the honeysuckle, because if you leave the stump and root, you’ve accomplished nothing. New leaves pop out, mocking us, in no time. And one root ball left means the colony will win. Before you know it, your hillside will resemble the unkempt hair of your lazy teenager.

The Warner Parks have been battling honeysuckle, too, and if you’ve retreated to those parks to stay sane and active during these past months of quarantine, then you will have seen the effects of their recent campaign to eradicate invasives once and for all. #InvasiveFreeWP is a comprehensive plan to remove invasive species, including the intolerable Japanese honeysuckle. Why is it so bad, you ask? Because it chokes out everything else. It chokes out all the native plant life and wildlife that could and should be naturally flourishing. When you see the woods without the invasives, it’s abundantly clear. I mean, literally, it is clear. There is visibility and air, space to breathe and move freely.

Removing invasives is about achieving clarity on the road to healthy abundance. This is happening in the landscapes around us. Is it happening in our inner landscapes, as well, I wonder? Have we, unwittingly, brought invasives into our society, our culture, our habits and our hearts and let them spread? Screens, screens, everywhere screens. Activities, activities, all the time activities. Excess, excess, everything in excess. What would be growing within if our fertile grounds weren’t so choked with invasives? I’d like to think that the quarantine has been our own #InvasiveFree campaign, whether we initiated it on our own or not. Stripping away all the things that overcrowded our minds and days, there is visibility and air, space to breathe and move freely. 

The question remains: Have we simply chopped them down, or have we pulled out the stump and root ball? I know from watching my husband battle honeysuckle on our small patch of woods in Forest Hills that this kind of work is backbreaking and relentless. It is not for the weak or the quitter. You have to commit to it and stay at it — be vigilant and strong. The invasives keep invading. The spiritual warrior keeps up the good fight. And slowly, all that which is native — all that which is our true nature — has room to grow and flourish.