Gardening without harmful invasive plants A guide to plants you can use in place of invasive non-natives Supported by: This guide, produced by the wild plant conservation charity Gardening Plantlife and the Royal Horticultural Society, can help you choose plants that are less likely to cause problems to the environment without should they escape from your garden. Even the most diligent harmful gardener cannot ensure that their plants do not escape over the invasive garden wall (as berries and seeds may be carried away by birds or plants the wind), so we hope you will fi nd this helpful. lslslsls There are laws surrounding invasive enaenaenaena r Rr Rr Rr R non-native plants. Dumping unwanted With over 70,000 plants to choose from and with new varieties being evoevoevoevoee plants, for example in a local stream or introduced each year, it is no wonder we are a nation of gardeners. ©Tr ©Tr ©Tr ©Tr ©Tr ©Tr © woodland, is an offence. Government also However, a few plants can cause you and our environment problems. has powers to ban the sale of invasive These are known as invasive non-native plants. Although they plants. At the time of producing this comprise a small minority of all the plants available to buy for your booklet there were no sales bans, but it An unsuspecting sheep fl ounders in a garden, the impact they can have is extensive and may be irreversible. river. Invasive Floating Pennywort can is worth checking on the websites below Around 60% of the invasive non-native plant species damaging our cause water to appear as solid ground. to fi nd the latest legislation that may be natural habitats originate from gardens and garden ponds. relevant to you: Department for Environment Some invasive non-native plants might be Food and Rural Affairs - www.defra.gov.uk straightforward for you to keep in check in your Scottish Government - garden or garden pond if you can tend to them www.scotland.gov.uk/invasivespecies frequently, but in the wider countryside, where such pruning and weeding effort is not feasible, At the moment, many invasive plants are still available to buy from these plants can cause problems for native plants garden centres, aquatics centres and other plant retailers. Cuttings and animals. Trying to get rid of problem plants from a friend’s garden may be taken from invasive plants. from natural habitats, especially important nature Make sure you know what you are buying and take conservation sites, is expensive and diffi cult. care before giving or accepting cuttings! Often complete eradication of such plants from the wild becomes impossible, and many hundreds of These websites provide more information about invasive thousands of pounds are spent each year in an effort plants that you may have in your garden or pond and to limit their spread. how to remove them if you wish to: Other invasive non-native plants can cause you diffi culties too. They Plantlife - www.plantlife.org.uk may quickly outgrow their space or become entrenched so that no Royal Horticultural Society - www.rhs.org.uk matter how hard you try to eliminate them, and regardless of how Non-Native Species Secretariat - www.nonnativespecies.org much of your fl ower bed is dug up, new shoots may keep on appearing. Alternatively, you can contact Plantlife on 01722 342730. 2 GARDENING WITHOUT HARMFUL INVASIVE PLANTS A PLANTLIFE / RHS GUIDE 3 How to use this guide CONTENTS Our suggested plants are divided into eight sections PAGE Much of the fun of growing plants comes from the reward of Groundcover plants 6 beautiful fl owers, scents or foliage. Your choice of plants will often Naturalising plants (including bulbs) 10 also refl ect what you want a plant to do – such as provide nectar to bees and butterfl ies, be able to thrive in a boggy area of your Architectural plants 15 garden, or provide a screen to separate one area from another. Climbers / Plants to cover walls 19 Invasive plants have sometimes been used in the past for those Shrubs 23 diffi cult areas of your garden – a particularly exposed patch, for Trees 30 example, or where a bare wall needs to be covered quickly. Meanwhile Plants for wildlife 33 plants for other aspects of gardening, like summer bedding plants, Plants for ponds and bog gardens 38 are unlikely to be invasive. This booklet covers those areas of the garden where, traditionally, invasive plants have most been used. Cultivation chart & index 45 The notorious invasive plant Japanese Knotweed, popular in Within each section the recommended plants cover a range of different sites Victorian times, for example, was sought after for its grand size and cultivation requirements. For example, we list shrubs which offer spring or and attractive leaves. We suggest safer tall feature plants with summer fl owers or stunning autumn colours, shrubs that are good for hedging attractive foliage to try in the ‘Architectural plants’ section. or providing background structure to your borders, and shrubs for sunny or shady spots. Although the plants we suggest shouldn’t cause you undue problems, as always with gardening, no matter which KEY TO SYMBOLS Tolerant of Needs sun Needs alkaline Needs acid Needs plants you use you will need to manage your garden by shade conditions conditions drier soils / low light levels weeding, thinning and pruning at regular intervals. Please remember that ALL unwanted plant matter should be disposed Needs Attractive Attractive Fine autumn Bears Structural feature Windbreak of responsibly. Compost or throw unwanted plant matter into your wetter soils fl owers foliage colours ornamental or screening/ green waste bin collection, or take it to your local recycling centre. fruit hedging The Be Plant Wise website has more information BOG Berries for birds Nectar Provides Submerged Floating Marginal / Bog garden about safe disposal of excess plant matter: source shelter/cover aquatic plant aquatic plant emergent plant for wildlife aquatic plant www.nonnativespecies.org/beplantwise Symbols under each plant highlight particular conditions the plant requires (for example, wet, dry, acid or alkaline soils, or full sun). Plants Happy invasives-free gardening! able to grow in shade are also indicated. A plant with no symbols is able to cope with a broad range of conditions. 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