Weeds are frontier plants and create an ecosystem that's viable for more demanding plants. Very few [native] weeds are bad on the whole for the ecosystem that it's part of, and many prevent the destruction of habitats due to climate change, bad soil, human activity.
Many times, those animal habitats have certain habits (poop, eating, etc.) that encourage the ecosystem to thrive. For example, an animal might eat the seeds of a tree and then poop further away from the tree. When the undigested seed inside fecal matter is strategically placed away from the shade of competing trees, it's allowed to grow. But in order for that to even happen, we need what many consider weeds to create healthy fertile soil with a healthy water table (which will dry out and become lower if the ground is bare and dry). A water table that is lower than normal will make it difficult for all but the deepest root growing plants to thrive.
Many weeds will thrive in harsh conditions like that and "prep" the soil for these plants including trees.
And of course, this digresses from the point of the article somewhat. Pollinating insects need plants to pollinate in order to survive. Many weeds are great for this purpose and will allow important pollinators to thrive. Along with urbanization, the temptation is to clear away all these "undesirable" plants - but we're also hurting the pollinators in the process.
It's good to see some research pointing to evidence to what should be common knowledge. Maybe we can convince people to stop making those ridiculous barren lawns and let some native weeds grow [emphasis on native].
We tend to try to differentiate between noxious weeds and pioneer plants. Most pioneer plants are labelled weeds, but not all weeds are pioneer plants with a whole indigenous food chain that goes along with it.
That's true, but most people aren't aware of the nuance. I tried to emphasize native plants in my post - the vast majority are pioneer plants (that natively grow in that particular ecosystem). There are certainly "weeds" for a particular ecosystem that are harmful. I refer to them as invasive species (and yet, aren't all native plants 'invasive' at one point in their evolution?). "Weeds" is a particularly loaded and poor term for describing most of these types of plants.
Can you give an example of a noxious weed that isn't a super useful pioneer?
Where I live, some of the top 5 weeds that feed the most insects (notably dandelion and a thistle), are also among the top annoying weeds in agriculture and vegetable gardening.
I wonder of Japanese knotweed could be used to re-establish habitats in nearly arid places. Kudzu has its uses for nitro-fixing and preventing erosion control.
Yeah, I know the technical definition of weeds. Many plants that get classified as weed is oftentimes plants that people don't want because it will grow where it wants to, thank you very much sir.
Just do it. We bought a plot that is (for where we live) fairly large. About 2/3 of it is meadow. Gorgeous wildflowers.
It's easy to do: Mow it once a year, in late summer, to prevent brush and trees from establishing. Remove the mowings, and never fertilize - or you'll have nothing but grass. It can take a few years and some helpful seeding, but the results are worth it.
Edited to add: since the wildflowers are native, you also never have to water.
Tbh grasslands (at least, mixed habitat) will give you a much richer diversity of fauna than pure forest. Grazers, pollinators, carnivores will all do better in open terrain.
There just aren't that many animals that thrive in a dense forest. Trees are hard to eat.
I find that hard to believe. Grasslands that are managed in the suggested way become nutrient poor and support way less life than a naturally grown forest. Everybody is eating from trees: nuts, fruit, leaves even the wood itself.
A natural forest - not the managed ones with just a couple of species - is absolutely teeming with life.
However, there is something in between nutritionally poor wildflower grassland and thick dense forest and I feel those hit the sweet spot.
Finally, I feel biodiversity is often given so much value that we don't even think about the amount of life anymore. It turns out that some ecologically managed grasslands do have a high number of species, but just not a lot of each one, whereas an open forest can harbor way more animals.
This makes sense: there is just not a lot to eat when you only have wildflowers on the menu.
Think about it this way — the sun is the prime energy input to a biome.
- In a temperate forest, basically nothing eats canopy foliage. Maybe they did when we had mastodons and forest elephants, but we don't now. Trees grow, die, and get eaten by fungus.
- In grasslands, nearly 100% of the photosynthesized energy is available to megafauna.
Deer simply can't eat the bark of adult trees, or get to the leaves. Yes, some trees drop a lot of nuts, but it's nothing compared to what a prarie can support (aka, millions of bison).
It's just not. I recommend you research deeper here. Fauna is richest only near the edges of the forest or near rivers. In a deep closed-canopy temperate forest, there's just really not that much going on.
That’s fine because bisons aren’t considered good pollinators.
Forests canopy is a very, very living biome for pollinators however. You’ll find birds, insects (and small mammals) in droves over the canopy but no “megafauna” indeed.
Francis Hallé work on forests, canopies and trees architecture is fascinating and insightful. He’s one of the creator of the “radeau des cimes”, an aerostat designed to study the canopy.
Bonus point: forest tends to retain water much better than grassland and therefore are less prone to drought.
> support way less life than a naturally grown forest.
do you have something i could read that supports this claim? it's my understanding that grasslands create more habitat and food compared to a closed canopy forest.
You’ll find insects in the (rich) soil, on the tree barks, on they leafs and on the canopy; bird make nest and shelter on and inside trees, sometimes with twigs and others debris; mammals lives in burrow between the roots and climb trees and eats their fruits and foliage.
There just aren't that many animals that thrive in a dense forest
Rainforests are as dense as they come and absolutely the peak of biodiversity on this planet (on land anyway, underwater is a whole other ballgame). They’re one of the only environments humans can survive in with literally nothing but knowledge of the plants and animals around you.
Off topic (?), but your remark made me nostalgic about glades; so I googled "glade" to get some pictures. The first two results were glade.com and a bunch of ads about deodorants. Fuck this shit :(
Not sure about the person you replied to, but here in northeast US if you don’t mow to keep trees down you can quickly end up with a very thick growth of trees. It’s also easy to end up with a lot of undesirable (invasive) species crowding out the native/desirable plants.
It may be the case that a small amount of trees is beneficial overall for pollinators but if you’re managing an area as described then it takes a bit more work to plan for trees and mow around them.
No, you want to remove the clippings. The soil needs to be (or become) nutrient poor if you want wildflowers. Otherwise, you just get grass, which is no use to pollinators.
When one wants strictly a meadow, then you're probably right. I'm doing that in a garden for a decade or more, and we have a mix of grass and wildflowers and "weeds", with abundant biodiversity.
Most of the predatory species on my property show up for the Queen Anne's Lace.
I'm slowly subbing in Yarrow, but initial observations are that the insects don't seem to like it as much. I need to spend some quality time just watching a plant to see.
My wife looked up all of the moths and butterflies that are native and in decline. She made a list of all the nursery plants and food plants and filled the garden with them. It felt like magic to see a small blue, a peacock butterfly, cinnabar so many different types of moths I can't even name. The bird population went up at the same time but my wife also ensures that they've always got fresh water to drink and bathe in.
Dear author, thank you for assuming what I assume. Quality journalism right there.
In my experience, insects like untreated nature the most. It pains me seeing how much "care" is being put into making things worse. Poisons, mowing, wasting water. It is only natural that such madness eventually leads to articles like this one.
I think in this case the "we" is our collective knowledge. That is, us at the the top of the bell curve where we learn things which are outright wrong and continue to propagate it.
"Weeds" are plants that are better at thriving than the anthropocentric ideal of manicured emerald lawns torn straight from bedroom communities of Irvine, CA.
"Weeds" species may be worth looking at as part of biomass carbon capture prior to processing for sequestration. That, at kelp. Unless we want to go down the path of 110 F summers and firestorms every 5 years.
Edit: My mom's house was built on fallow farmland with a strip of wild meadow behind it. The bug density is obviously high there, so I set up 2 large bug zappers (Flowtron BK-40D) producing a ~200 g pile of insects every night. The only problem is someone didn't like cleaning vs. being accosted by bugs including mosquitos carrying WNV. :/ I did my part by underscoring the risks and debilitating post-WNV symptoms.
This feels like a logical extension from "monocultures are bad." Like, I get they're useful for us, but we seem to be relearning again and again that the further you get from monoculture the better ecosystems do... And it's like, in the name "ecosystem" it's not "eco-10-plants-that-look-nice-when-lined-up".
"Blackberries, for example, are widely eaten as a wild food in Britain, while the name Ivy holds a special place for some."
Ok, gotta stop you right there, lol. Blackberries, particularly Himalayan Blackberries, in the PNW are a prime example of what makes something a noxious weed. They will decimate an ecosystem.
There are a lot of 'weeds' that are called such because they're 'not the plants you want' in a certain spot. But then there are weeds that actually threaten habitats. English Ivy is another example. What's native somewhere (this article appears to be centered in the UK) can be a terrible idea elsewhere.
Blackberries are delicious – but if you let them reproduce, they will absolutely take over and smother out all of the delicate balance that so many species rely on.
My recommendation is to keep it simple. If you have a monoculture lawn and you want to add some diversity, start with something like clover. You will see a TON of pollinators. Then pick edges where you can maintain wildflowers. In our area it would be things like Lupine and Douglas Meadowfoam. Different kinds of irises, etc. You can likely find a native seed mix for sale near you.
A lot of people have mentioned things like Yarrow or Queen Anne's Lace. Keep in mind that many of these plants closely resemble Poison Hemlock. This is another reason I like to keep things simple – I like to have a good sense of what's growing, so that a child or an animal doesn't accidentally pick and handle something toxic.
Source: I've restored and now maintain over 20 acres of Oak Woodland and Upland Prairie in collaboration with our local NRCS branch (our local Soil & Water district that's part of the USDA). I even seeded nearly 6 acres of it – an incredibly steep slope – entirely by hand.
I don't think it's an 'of course' to everyone. But my larger point is that there's a benefit to keeping things somewhat simple to the point where you can identify what's growing, starting with slow incremental changes, and getting a feel for what you're doing rather than assuming a diverse mix is healthy simply because it's not a monoculture.
True, it's not an of course to everyone, and it's a good thing to point out. In fact I think everyone should do at least some research on anything they are going to plant, if only to give it the best conditions to thrive.
"weeds" is such a noxious concept. the municipalities around here force people to "keep property free of weeds (dandelions, etc)".
how can you change that when all citizens believe that it is good because it's legislated, and keeping immaculate lawns is so ingrained.
I don’t fertilize or water my lawn. It has grass and a mix of wild flowers, clover, mint and moss where there is not much sun. When the mint and clover flower it is full of bees. At night I have lightning bugs. Getting the perfect grass is over rated.
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[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 98.0 ms ] threadMany times, those animal habitats have certain habits (poop, eating, etc.) that encourage the ecosystem to thrive. For example, an animal might eat the seeds of a tree and then poop further away from the tree. When the undigested seed inside fecal matter is strategically placed away from the shade of competing trees, it's allowed to grow. But in order for that to even happen, we need what many consider weeds to create healthy fertile soil with a healthy water table (which will dry out and become lower if the ground is bare and dry). A water table that is lower than normal will make it difficult for all but the deepest root growing plants to thrive.
Many weeds will thrive in harsh conditions like that and "prep" the soil for these plants including trees.
And of course, this digresses from the point of the article somewhat. Pollinating insects need plants to pollinate in order to survive. Many weeds are great for this purpose and will allow important pollinators to thrive. Along with urbanization, the temptation is to clear away all these "undesirable" plants - but we're also hurting the pollinators in the process.
It's good to see some research pointing to evidence to what should be common knowledge. Maybe we can convince people to stop making those ridiculous barren lawns and let some native weeds grow [emphasis on native].
Where I live, some of the top 5 weeds that feed the most insects (notably dandelion and a thistle), are also among the top annoying weeds in agriculture and vegetable gardening.
I grow weed like that on my balcony. Thyme, they call it.
Weed is just "plants you don't want".
It's easy to do: Mow it once a year, in late summer, to prevent brush and trees from establishing. Remove the mowings, and never fertilize - or you'll have nothing but grass. It can take a few years and some helpful seeding, but the results are worth it.
Edited to add: since the wildflowers are native, you also never have to water.
There just aren't that many animals that thrive in a dense forest. Trees are hard to eat.
A natural forest - not the managed ones with just a couple of species - is absolutely teeming with life.
However, there is something in between nutritionally poor wildflower grassland and thick dense forest and I feel those hit the sweet spot.
Finally, I feel biodiversity is often given so much value that we don't even think about the amount of life anymore. It turns out that some ecologically managed grasslands do have a high number of species, but just not a lot of each one, whereas an open forest can harbor way more animals.
This makes sense: there is just not a lot to eat when you only have wildflowers on the menu.
- In a temperate forest, basically nothing eats canopy foliage. Maybe they did when we had mastodons and forest elephants, but we don't now. Trees grow, die, and get eaten by fungus.
- In grasslands, nearly 100% of the photosynthesized energy is available to megafauna.
Deer simply can't eat the bark of adult trees, or get to the leaves. Yes, some trees drop a lot of nuts, but it's nothing compared to what a prarie can support (aka, millions of bison).
Forests canopy is a very, very living biome for pollinators however. You’ll find birds, insects (and small mammals) in droves over the canopy but no “megafauna” indeed.
Francis Hallé work on forests, canopies and trees architecture is fascinating and insightful. He’s one of the creator of the “radeau des cimes”, an aerostat designed to study the canopy.
Bonus point: forest tends to retain water much better than grassland and therefore are less prone to drought.
you're gonna have to cite this claim
> Forests perform important buffering functions, such as cooling effects, the interception of precipitation, and water infiltration and retention.
https://www.fao.org/sustainable-forest-management/toolbox/mo...
do you have something i could read that supports this claim? it's my understanding that grasslands create more habitat and food compared to a closed canopy forest.
> Forests contain much of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity, including insects, birds, and mammals
https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/five-major...
You’ll find insects in the (rich) soil, on the tree barks, on they leafs and on the canopy; bird make nest and shelter on and inside trees, sometimes with twigs and others debris; mammals lives in burrow between the roots and climb trees and eats their fruits and foliage.
> contain much of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity
"much" that's like not science
Rainforests are as dense as they come and absolutely the peak of biodiversity on this planet (on land anyway, underwater is a whole other ballgame). They’re one of the only environments humans can survive in with literally nothing but knowledge of the plants and animals around you.
https://www.lonelyplanet.com/news/hallerbos-forest-belgium-b...
It may be the case that a small amount of trees is beneficial overall for pollinators but if you’re managing an area as described then it takes a bit more work to plan for trees and mow around them.
I'm slowly subbing in Yarrow, but initial observations are that the insects don't seem to like it as much. I need to spend some quality time just watching a plant to see.
Dear author, thank you for assuming what I assume. Quality journalism right there.
In my experience, insects like untreated nature the most. It pains me seeing how much "care" is being put into making things worse. Poisons, mowing, wasting water. It is only natural that such madness eventually leads to articles like this one.
"Weeds" species may be worth looking at as part of biomass carbon capture prior to processing for sequestration. That, at kelp. Unless we want to go down the path of 110 F summers and firestorms every 5 years.
Edit: My mom's house was built on fallow farmland with a strip of wild meadow behind it. The bug density is obviously high there, so I set up 2 large bug zappers (Flowtron BK-40D) producing a ~200 g pile of insects every night. The only problem is someone didn't like cleaning vs. being accosted by bugs including mosquitos carrying WNV. :/ I did my part by underscoring the risks and debilitating post-WNV symptoms.
Ok, gotta stop you right there, lol. Blackberries, particularly Himalayan Blackberries, in the PNW are a prime example of what makes something a noxious weed. They will decimate an ecosystem.
There are a lot of 'weeds' that are called such because they're 'not the plants you want' in a certain spot. But then there are weeds that actually threaten habitats. English Ivy is another example. What's native somewhere (this article appears to be centered in the UK) can be a terrible idea elsewhere.
Blackberries are delicious – but if you let them reproduce, they will absolutely take over and smother out all of the delicate balance that so many species rely on.
My recommendation is to keep it simple. If you have a monoculture lawn and you want to add some diversity, start with something like clover. You will see a TON of pollinators. Then pick edges where you can maintain wildflowers. In our area it would be things like Lupine and Douglas Meadowfoam. Different kinds of irises, etc. You can likely find a native seed mix for sale near you.
A lot of people have mentioned things like Yarrow or Queen Anne's Lace. Keep in mind that many of these plants closely resemble Poison Hemlock. This is another reason I like to keep things simple – I like to have a good sense of what's growing, so that a child or an animal doesn't accidentally pick and handle something toxic.
Source: I've restored and now maintain over 20 acres of Oak Woodland and Upland Prairie in collaboration with our local NRCS branch (our local Soil & Water district that's part of the USDA). I even seeded nearly 6 acres of it – an incredibly steep slope – entirely by hand.