There is some good in everything I suppose, but the value in the
buckthorn hedge, the ornamental European honeysuckle from the garden center,
and the black locust outside of its range in the southeastern US is far
outweighed by the harm to native vegetation done by these extremely invasive
exotics. As edge species, all of them establish readily in our
fragmented forests and in our natural prairie/forest borders, before invading
and out-competing the natives in both directions. You may drive a long way in
SE Wisconsin before you can even find a place where it is possible
to enter a native oak woods through the living picket fence that surrounds it,
and you can almost stand and watch as a black locust clone takes over a sand
prairie in Central WI. Bur oak makes good fence posts, lots of natives trees
make good firewood, and honeybees and the native insects that are attracted to
black locust flowers are less likely to pollinate the native pl ants that
bloom in that season.
Even though it has been 8 years since I carefully cut every one of
the seed bearing age trees of these species in my 25 acre oak/maple
woods, and most of those that border it on my neighbor's land, I still
pull many hundreds of seedlings every spring
I would hope that aware NAFEX members would not choose to
contribute to this huge problem.
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