Try These NATIVE NORTHEAST SHRUB Alternatives to These 10 Non-Native Shrubs — Ep. 160

I believe one problem with burning bush is that birds love the berries but there is no nutrition in them for the birds. I’m told they load up on the berries before migration and then don’t have the fuel they need to make it to their destination. It is illegal to plant them in NH and MA (and others).

Another native alternative to butterfly bush: baptisia. Gorgeous blue or yellow blooms and a shrubby habit too. Interestingly, the Japanese use their azaleas in a close clipped boxwood-type way. I guess our native deciduous azaleas have a more open habit. Anyway, very informative video. I learned a lot.

One that didn't get a shoutout is the elderberry. The pollinators are obsessed with it. We also have a lot of native blueberries that have flame red leaves in fall

In a previous home I grew our native beautyberry. I put about ten plants against a south facing side of the house. The soil was terrible, rock and clay. This plant performed beautifully and got better every year. I wanted this plant to stay compact so I cut it all the way to the ground early in the spring. Nothing compares to this plant when it's covered with purple berries. I would highly recommend it for a sunny, hot location.

This is such helpful and valuable information as I transition from non-native to native plants. Thanks once again for your articulate style!

The purple or dark leaves varieties of ninebarks shrubs have anthcyanines in them and prevent insects from using them . Better to go either green native variety. I think what your doing is showing good land stewardship. I applaud you for all your hard-working efforts. This video is very valuable to people that don’t have an understanding of how native plants help the environment. Thank you for all your hard work.

We're in central Wisconsin (5a) and purchased our farmstead from an avid gardener. I've been doing the research, though, and it turns out more than half of the plants on the property are invasive species! To add insult to injury, many of them are on the prohibited/restricted list from our DNR, so getting them out is a priority this year. These videos have been SO incredibly helpful as a starting place as my partner and I are trying to decide what to replace existing plantings with in a way that's truly beneficial to pollinators and our local ecosystem, so thank you for making them! Loving this series, and so appreciative of your channel! Reminds me of the gardening and horticulture programs on OPB growing up.

This is so exciting! I've been 'wilding' my urban lot in central Ohio for a few years now (I only have about 0.25 acre). I have at least seven Asian bush honeysuckles that have crept in and I've been looking for Ohio native alternatives. I'm lucky to have an amazing native plant nursery less than five miles from my house, so I'm going to go there & get black chokeberry (Aronia melanocarpa) & common winterberry (Ilex verticillata) when they open in April. I also have quite a bit of vining Japanese honeysuckle, so I'm thinking of replacing it with crossvine (Bignonia capreolata), which I haven't found a source for yet. Anyway, I love love love your channel & appreciate your attention given to native plants and how they benefit nature (most especially specialist pollinators like solitary bees). Thank you for all you do!

Ilex crenata is taught to us in university to plant in exchange of our beloved Buxus sempervirens. Cydalima perspectalis has ravaged a big chunk of our Viennese trees that once were planted in front of all the castles and in the parks. They are also dioecious, so you can just get a male one. People that don't know much about Buxus don't even see a difference <3

This is one of the very best, informative, and sensible videos I've seen to educate myself about native shrubs. Thank you so much ❣️

We don't live in NY, but our now elderly, actually professional 'hobby' gardeners, in the neighborhood, have chosen many of these plants. I can now appreciate the thought given to their fine choices, even more than before. I see that they wanted their gardens to maintain the original plan, to be a nice vision and to save work. Most schrubs are already flowering with just some tiny encouragement, from fleeting rays of the March sun. The area has lost many of the older trees, so there is less shade to interfere. These bushes have survived the drought of 3 years, as well. Students have walked right through thorn hedges, with those reddish-green leaves and red berries, around school grounds and have made lasting paths...city deer. These plants are really into the Spring season, which makes a freezing dog walk that much more enjoyable. Flowers popping out of bark, is amazing. Most of the berries, in all colors are not eaten by the birds and hopefully not by children either. One Winter the birds did go after dark blue berries, otherwise they remain as decoration. I guess that most are poisonous. An old spiny wild rose blooms beautifully, in a piece of earth, surrounded by cement block walkways. That way, it can't spread. The scent is special and reminds me of old-fashioned roses from my Grandmother's garden and of wild delicate pink roses found in fields where we used to play. You can't pick them, the vines are ferocious. Thanks for the video and the nomenclature, for the eventual search at the garden center. I am curious. What is your goal beyond all of the uprooting and planting, or do we have to stay tuned to find out? 😅Hope there is no great erosion when the great melt happens. ☃️⛄🌊☀️

What a treasure your channel is!! I’m trying to use permaculture principles to revitalize the native ecology on my sloped, shady lot with an over population of deer due to development and destruction of habitat. You are a great resource. BTW My mountain laurel was decimated by deer. So frustrating.

I love your videos. So much good info. I was born and raised in Carbondale and now live in Portland Oregon. I noticed the newspaper article was about work done in Jessup. Coal mines left a horrible legacy such as the Carbondale mine fire that was finally put out when I was in High School. Such a beautiful area. Thank You for contributing to the healing of the land in NEPA. ❤

Thanks for the useful video. The previous owner of our property actually put rosa multiflora in the garden beds. I ripped those out (with the help of some strong young men) and am working on the edge of our wooded areas. In addition to spreading like crazy, these roses are a vector for rose rosette disease. There is also a lot of Japanese knotweed in the area -- ugh. I see it in ditches but on my property it also grows on a dry slope and in the crevices of retaining walls. Unfortunately I have found that only chemical means can eradicate this pest and it's a laborious process of cutting the canes and spraying the stubs. I also pulled out the butterfly bushes from the beds and am working on their progeny elsewhere on the property. There are some beautiful cultivars that are sterile, but you have to do research to identify those. There should be warning labels on nursery plants. My fantasy is that we use genetic engineering to cause deer to eat only the invasives! I have planted many of the natives you suggest and am going to try some of the others. I am experimenting with blueberries as a substitute for burning bush (my husband loves the fall color of the euonymus). Thank you again for encouraging people to grow our wonderful native plants.

The native rose suggestion is so interesting. Talk about under-publicized plants! I never hear anything about them.

Love these informational videos with native plant suggestions! So useful and informative.

I love ninebarks also, however, there is a real problem with powdery mildew....

Thank you for this video!!! We have been looking for native alternatives for a few of these. Love your content ❤

This video was very helpful. I live in north east Indiana and I’m trying to turn my property into a native landscape! I’m trying to start New Jersey Tea and Black Chokeberry here for my foundation landscape. Cheers!

really enjoy these types of videos, since i've tried to research a lot of this myself tbh. paying the most attention to the buckthorn and honeysuckle sections because oh my GOD those two families of plants have spent the last several years driving me insane. only last year have i finally seen my efforts to remove them pay off with some native elderberries pop up, but i definitely need to look into what you recommended more, because i need something to help refill those spaces. those plus the occasional euonymus, like i swear i didn't even know what any of our native shrubs looked like until i got into gardening because there were none in this yard beyond some hidden dogwoods and sumac