Southern Indiana Cooperative Invasives Management This is Invasive Species Awareness Week in Indiana and it is Friday....Get out there this weekend and identify and destroy some invasive plants! Call our office for more details on the upcoming hands-on educational opportunities to learn more! 765-349-2060 ... See more
Have you noticed the green shrubs leafing out like in this photo? It's likely that you're seeing Asian Bush Honeysuckle, a highly invasive shrub in our state that turns green earlier than our native shrubs this time of year, making it an easy target to identify and remove.
These upright shrubs with arching branches are 6-15 feet tall. Each of these species has opposite leaves with paired berries and hollow branchlets. They stand out in the understory of forests as the first shrubs to leaf out in the spring and the last to lose their leaves in the fall. The paired, tubular flowers are white on Amur and Morrow honeysuckle, pink on Tartarian honeysuckle, and vary from white to deep rose on Belle’s honeysuckle. The red to orange berries are dispersed by birds. Commonly sold cultivars include Arnold’s Red, Zabelli and Rem Red.
INVASIVE
Asian bush honeysuckles grow so densely they shade out everything on the forest floor, often leaving nothing but bare soil. This means a great reduction in the food and cover available for birds and other animals.
Serious infestations can inhibit tree regeneration, essentially stopping forest succession. Higher rates of nest predation have been found in Amur honeysuckle than in native shrubs due to nests being more exposed to predators. Some bush honeysuckle species also release chemicals into the soil to inhibit other plant growth, effectively poisoning the soil.
More information on this plant found here: https://www.in.gov/dnr/files/Bush_Honeysuckle.pdf
Picture taken by Regional Specialist, Amber Slaughterbeck, along the Wabashiki Trail in West Terre Haute, IN. ... See more
