Exotic plants

[Michael Gochfeld]

There are some really creepy exotic vines in Florida (and in the
southeast and in the northeast). 

several years ago I heard a seminar on exotics in Florida (and the
different degrees of invasivity and the factors that would enhance or
retard invasivity). 

But the message I remember is that there are species that have some
official pest status, but are still being sold in nurseries for gardens. 

Last week at Albany NY I found a nursery selling Oriental Bittersweet
(Celastrus orbiculatus), despite that plant's devastating impacts on
forest edges. 

Invasive potential will be different in different habitats and in the
wall to wall suburbs it may be less critical than in "natural" habitats. 

MIKE GOCHFELD


QUOTE:                 ECOLOGICAL THREAT: Oriental bittersweet is an
aggressive invader that threatens all vegetation levels
                of forested and open areas. It grows over other
vegetation, completely covering it, and kills other plants by
                preventing photosynthesis, girdling, and uprooting by
force of its massive weight. In the northeastern U.S.,
                exotic Oriental bittersweet appears to be displacing the
native climbing bittersweet, Celastrus scandens,
                which occurs in similar habitats, through competition
and hybridization.  
http://www.nps.gov/plants/alien/fact/ceor1.htm

 
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