Ever wondered how a couple of Diphonbachia plants, also known as dumb cane, could revitalize your living space? It's time to find out! Join me, Carla, as I gush over these new leafy members of my household and share the essential tips for keeping them thriving—and away from our curious pets. But the green talk doesn't stop there; ever heard of Chinese evergreens? They're the beginner-friendly houseplants that not only withstand low light but also scrub the air clean, a fact backed by NASA studies. And yes, I'm here to guide you through nurturing these tropical beauties, especially through the dry, static-filled winter months.
Shifting our gaze to the outdoors, our conversation blooms into a vital discussion about our local ecosystems. I'll walk you through the often-overlooked issue of invasive species—those unwelcome guests in our gardens that can cause more harm than good. With insights from the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, we'll explore these intruders and ways to remove them. Whether your garden is your sanctuary or your contribution to our planet's health, let's cultivate our knowledge and green thumbs to make a positive impact right in our backyards.
PLEASE follow all state and local laws applicable to your area for when dealing with invasive species on public lands.
Ever wondered how a couple of Diphonbachia plants, also known as dumb cane, could revitalize your living space? It's time to find out! Join me, Carla, as I gush over these new leafy members of my household and share the essential tips for keeping them thriving—and away from our curious pets. But the green talk doesn't stop there; ever heard of Chinese evergreens? They're the beginner-friendly houseplants that not only withstand low light but also scrub the air clean, a fact backed by NASA studies. And yes, I'm here to guide you through nurturing these tropical beauties, especially through the dry, static-filled winter months.
Shifting our gaze to the outdoors, our conversation blooms into a vital discussion about our local ecosystems. I'll walk you through the often-overlooked issue of invasive species—those unwelcome guests in our gardens that can cause more harm than good. With insights from the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, we'll explore these intruders and ways to remove them. Whether your garden is your sanctuary or your contribution to our planet's health, let's cultivate our knowledge and green thumbs to make a positive impact right in our backyards.
PLEASE follow all state and local laws applicable to your area for when dealing with invasive species on public lands.
Hey friends, welcome back to the garden. I'm Carla and I'm excited to have you join me for another episode of Growing with Carla. Whether you're a seasoned plant parent or just starting to bud out, this is the place to share our ideas and grow together as we nurture our leafy babies. We have another fun topic to go over today, but first let's do a plant update. I don't have a large update this week for the plant update, just a big shout out to Emma from CrossFit. She gave me two plants because they're moving and I love these plants already. When I put them into the Greg app, it auto gave them a name of Harry, which is kind of funny to the Greg app, and Otto gave them a name of Harry, which is kind of funny. But these plants are and I'll include pictures on Instagram. It's called a Diphonbachia, or Diphonbachia, also known as dumb cane or dumb cant. This is a plant that is toxic to pets, so I'm definitely going to be keeping it away from bed of fear, but it's absolutely gorgeous these plants are. They're very healthy when she gave them to me and I'm so excited to have them around the house. They have really beautiful long leaves and I think they're going to do great. They're already sprucing up the place.
Carla:
I wanted to do a plant spotlight because my friend Tina asked about if I knew anything about Chinese evergreens. The answer is no, or the answer was no until I went and dug into this. At least I thought maybe there was one growing outside my back patio from when my mother-in-law landscaped the area, but no, that one is actually a plantain lily, a hosta, which looks similar to the pictures of the Chinese evergreen that I've seen. But when I identified it using the Greg app, the hosta came up. But I did do some digging about the Chinese evergreen Scientific name Aglaonema I believe that's how it's pronounced is kind of a tropical plant. It is very intolerant of cold temperatures, so that's why I'm pretty sure the one outside is not one of these, because it's been out there for years and we get cold snow ice here in Virginia. The Chinese evergreen does produce flowers. They look much like a small calla lily bloom. They don't need a lot of light, which is cool. They are very beginner friendly. However, they are toxic if ingested. So that's your pet warning there is don't let your pets eat them. A positive fun fact though, according to the NASA Clean Air Study, that any species within the Aglaonema family are effective at removing common household air toxins such as formaldehyde and benzene, so they're a great indoor plant to have. If you are anywhere in the United States where it gets cold, I highly recommend making sure that they go into like an indoor greenhouse for the winter where you can keep the temperature and humidity higher. Green house for the winter where you can keep the temperature and humidity higher, because I know in the winter in our house the humidity in the house gets really low and we start getting static, so then we have to start digging out the humidifiers. Definitely keep this plant indoors in a warmer, slightly sunny spot.
Carla:
Today's topic I want to kind of have a continuing conversation about supporting local. There's a bunch of different things that I want to talk about for supporting local, but I also want to give some practical advice in this episode, because a lot of the previous episodes have been a lot of theory and just enjoyment and you guys should still be able to get some practical application out of this too. At least that's the goal. So for this one I wanted to talk about invasive species. So when we're gardening, if our garden is an indoor garden or indoor plant collection, you're not going to have too much issue with invasive species. So this really applies to outdoor gardens, yards, etc. Outdoor gardens, yards, etc.
Carla:
So invasive plants are species intentionally or accidentally introduced by human activity into a region which they did not evolve in and they caused harm to natural resources, economic activity or humans. And this is according to the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation. They also have another section in there versus sometimes you have an introduced species. These do not cause problems and are often beneficial in normally agriculture and horticulture. So you're thinking wheats, soybeans and tulips, like these things have been introduced into the area but they're not. Their purpose is not invasive because they're not. Their purpose is not invasive because they're being used for economic activity and that can kind of lead into ethics that I want to talk about later. So when we're dealing with our outside gardens, a lot of the times what we're dealing with invasive species in our yard they're probably windblown seeds or brought by animals into our gardens. A lot of the reason that invasive species are introduced into a new area, besides the natural being carried by animals or the wind, is human activity. So the main kind of plants that we're dealing with have often thought to be decorative or beautiful in some way to add value to a house, and then later it was discovered that, no, these are actually really bad and we can't control them like we thought we could.
Carla:
I can't speak for the entire world, or even the entire United States, but here in Virginia there are six main invasive species that we have to watch out for, and this is according to the Smithsonian's website. The first is purple loosestrife. Now, this is the only invasive species that I'm aware of that they have biological control measures with which to manage it, and a biological control is a way to manage invasive plants using either plant disease or insects predators from the targeted species home environment, and using this is very risky, because if you're bringing across more species, how are we to know if they are also going to be invasive? Or is what they are going to come here and crossbreed with something and create a hybrid that takes over the? That also becomes invasive? The following ones are Japanese Honeysuckle, japanese Barberry, which there was a time when there was a lot of Barberry removed because it wasn't easily identifiable between the American variety and the Japanese variety, so they just tore out the lot. The Norway maple, english ivy, is a huge one that I see around here, especially in parks, and the last one is kudzu, which looks beautiful but will choke out everything that it touches it just consumes. So if you have a raised garden or a well-established garden, you're not going to have as much of an issue with invasive species as you would if you were brand new, setting up a new area to tend to, or even if you're just cultivating the land to increase local native plants or create like a pollinator's flower bed when we're on our own private lands.
Carla:
There are two main ways that we can manage invasive plants. There's the mechanical way and the chemical way, and these are just the scientific terms, for mechanical would be physically removing the plants and or the roots, so this includes pulling and digging. It's important, though, when you're pulling and digging, to make sure that you remove as much of the root as possible, because some invasive species, like the Japanese barberry, even if you leave a centimeter of root, it'll just start growing all over again. For pulling and digging, it's easier to accomplish this in the spring or the fall, where the ground is softer and it's not so hot outside. Another way to have a mechanical removal plants is to cover them with a UV resistant material. So this is why sometimes we'll put cardboard down in our garden and then soak it, because it's preventing the Sun from reaching the ground beneath, so any kind of weed will get. It won't be able to receive nutrients and so it'll just kind of die out. There is also like UV resistant plastic sheeting that some people recommend or that you can purchase at garden centers. But the problem with these is sometimes they don't always deteriorate very well and so you'll be pulling plastic out of your garden for a really long time. And the last one we actually had to do a couple summers ago now and it's just mowing and cutting my friend had a huge patch of poison ivy in his backyard and we were trying to install a pool. So we physically cut down all the poison ivy and then he's been maintaining it so that it doesn't grow back. And that's a big problem with any kind of mechanical removal of invasive species is you have to maintain it for at least a few years, maybe longer, depending on how well rooted that plant system had.
Carla:
There are also chemical ways to manage invasive species. A lot of these you would do with any kind of weed in your garden. Some of them come in spray canisters where you can put them directly on the plant or directly on the soil. Others are more of a paste or a paint, so you would cut the plant low to the ground and then put this cover on the stem or the stump, and then it would be able to go down into the roots and then chemically impair the plant so that it can't grow anymore or proliferate itself. So then this kind of goes into the ethics question of is it okay to remove invasive species from public lands, and this is a very tender topic for some.
Carla:
There are state and local laws that need to be abided by when it comes to removing plants of any kind from public spaces. When I was searching online, there was quite a few where it said it was illegal to take any kind of plant or destroy any kind of plant from any public space, like a park or a reserve or anything. But we also have people who like to call themselves rogue weeders or weeding vigilantes, who whenever they see an invasive species in a public space, they will go ahead and remove it or break it in some way. So there's a few problems with this, like removing and weeding in your own garden. You need to know exactly what kind of plant you're pulling out. If you're not 100% sure whether it's a native plant or an invasive species, you probably shouldn't be touching that plant. However, if you have been well seasoned in understanding the different phases of types of plants and are fully aware of whether the particular plant is invasive or is native, then you might be okay being a weeding vigilante. Again, please make sure to follow all local and state laws regarding your public spaces. There was a lot of conflict in the online forum that I was reading about this. There are some places that do request volunteers and they'll do walkthroughs regularly of the public land and have people trained specifically to look for certain different invasive species and have those removed. So it might be worth looking into, if your area doesn't have those kind of days, that maybe you could work with your local sheriff or maybe your local politicians to have that kind of training available and create regular volunteer troops.
Carla:
The idea of why this is so troubling to me is because of this theory of tragedy of the commons. Now, how this basically is represented is say, we are a bunch of sheep herders and there is a public field in which we are all allowed to use. Now it's not regulated. It doesn't say that only Tom's sheep can eat on Tuesday and I can only use the field on Fridays, so we kind of self-regulate it. Now the solution only works if everyone's on board with it. If not everyone's on board with it, then we get the tragedy of the commons, where people see a free resource and they overindulge in it and eventually that resource becomes diminished because the people who are indulging in it are not taken care of and respecting and being conservation minded in that space. So if we have our natural parks and we see them becoming overrun with invasive species and we're unable to do anything about it, eventually our parks are going to change and they're no longer going to be hospitable to the native species that were there originally. But on the other hand, if we have these weeding vigilantes who go through and I'm not encouraging it, but go through and take it upon themselves to remove invasive species, then is it going to be maintained. So this is. I'd like to hear your opinions on it, if you think this whole weeding vigilante thing is a good thing or a bad thing, or how you feel about how public spaces should be maintained.
Carla:
All right, friends, I really appreciate you for taking time out of your busy day to be with me. It means a lot. If you enjoyed this episode or found any part of it useful, please share it with those that you love, those that you like, or even those that you just tolerate that also really like plants. It would help me out greatly. Please also check out my Instagram and send me pictures of your plant babies. Tag me at GrowingWithCarla. I would love to see them. Remember, be safe and make wise choices. We'll talk again next time.