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Like many woodlands in the eastern US, mine is full of vines. Vines connect the undergrowth in an impenetrable web of living steel and drape tree crowns in a smothering curtain that has caused many a tree to topple. There is great hullabaloo about invasive non-native plants these days, but the worst offenders in my woods are native vines; only one is a foreign escapee. Both the native and non-native vines provide food and shelter for birds and wildlife. Most of them have some ornamental value, too...or would have in much more modest quantities. Two of them are allowed to decorate parts of my garden, but I keep a watchful eye on them. Japanese Honeysuckle The only non-native vine in my woodlands, Lonicera japonica var.halliana (Hall's honeysuckle) is, however, on my hit list. I have pulled miles of it in my clearing operations. This lovely thug was introduced to the US in 1862 by Dr. George Hall, after whom it was named. Old references often call it woodbine. L. japonica is a trailing and climbing woody vine belonging to the honeysuckle family, (Caprifoliaceae); native to east Asia, including Japan and Korea. It has spread itself around the world, primarily by way of horticultural introductions. Hall's honeysuckle is more rampant than the species. It's hard for me to believe that there are still nurseries selling this weed and people planting it for the flowers (admittedly lovely and fragrant) and as a groundcover. And, cover ground it will! My woods has great mats of it on the ground and understory shrubs and forbs are strangled by it. As you can see from the image (which was only one section of one smallish mat), it sends numerous slender stems from a thick, whitish root. Each of those will root where a node touches moist soil or climb any small diameter object it encounters. Having "escaped" from cultivation at the beginning of this century, it is now found through twenty-six states on a line from Massachusetts west to Illinois and Missouri and southwest through Texas and Mexico. The only thing that stops it from further heading north is the extremely cold winter temperature. There are so many other, more worthy and well-behaved, members of this genus for our gardens that his vine should never be planted on purpose.
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