Last workday, volunteer Cameron Homes of Homes Landscaping Inc of Wilson offered professional guidance for tackling removal of wisteria, privet, briars, and other invasive plants. We’re pleased that his advice affirms much of what we’ve been doing to date. Homes suggests that we:

• Remove scattered dead brush other than pine straw and leaves to the parking lot curbside via tarp-loads. Also remove dead and dying hanging vines insofar as they are safely accessible. [We’ve been raking the ground cover away, but this is essentially mulch and will help keep down weedy new growth.]
• Do not disturb yucca, daffodils, or other decorative plants. [We’ve been preaching this! Families placed these plants at graves, often in lieu of expensive stone or concrete markers. Wisteria is the exception to this rule.]
• Place brush in neat piles of lengths of about 6 feet for claw truck collection by the city’s Sanitation Department.
• Clip wisteria and privet growth at a height about two feet above the ground so that their leafy spring growth will be easier to identify and treat with sprayed defoliant.
• Establish limited paths cleared to ground level for access to interior locations;  remove brush via tarps and light wheeled equipment.
• Remove only specified dead or damaged trees and live invasive trees to near ground level. [This work can be dangerous and should be done only by experienced teams of volunteers.]
• Remove trash and other identified debris to parking lot curb in large heavy duty black bags. Buried trash can be carefully dug out of the ground using tined digging forks. [Piles of trash often line former access ways used by vehicles to dump. Before removing a pile, please photo the area and get a GPS location reading with your phone. (Ask a LSP team member for help if needed.) We’d like to plot these points to map out these pathways. Anybody know a Boy Scout looking for a project??]

Thank you, Cameron and Bo!