Volunteers with the Blazing Stars CISMA in Columbus clear out invasive species from woodlands in Mill Race Park. Photo provided by Blazing Stars
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COLUMBUS — For years, large green bushes adorned with red berries have filled the woods along the banks of the Flatrock River where it passes through a park near downtown Columbus.
The plant called bush honeysuckle looks lush and attractive, but it’s really an invasive species that hides a lethal secret. Once it takes root, it deadens the soil and kills out native plants that provide food and shelter to local wildlife.
At Mill Race Park in Columbus, it was everywhere, according to Heather Shireman, director of the Bartholomew County Soil and Water Conservation District.
“It was an insane amount,” she said. “You don’t realize just how much is there until you start pulling it out.”
That’s just what a group of around 30 volunteers did in 2022. For two hours, they cut, sawed and hacked out hundreds of pounds of the bush, stacking it into piles that sometimes reached over seven feet high.
Now, bluebells and other native Indiana flowers have sprouted back in the areas where the invasive plant for years had choked them out.
“I think we’ve had a huge impact,” Shireman said. “Our parks are looking so much better.”
A GRASSROOTS PROGRAM
The volunteers in Columbus are part of a group called Blazing Stars, and they’re far from alone.
The nonprofit formed in 2020 as a Cooperative Invasive Species Management Area (CISMA), which are public-private partnerships funded in part by a U.S. Department of Agriculture program. Each area is run by local volunteers who work to engage residents to stop and eradicate nonnative plants in their communities.
Today, there are 42 active CISMAs in Indiana. The goal is to create in total more than 60 locally operated management areas that encompass every county in the state, according to Dawn Slack, director of the Indiana Invasives Initiative, which is part of the CISMA program.
That makes Indiana unique. Most states have regional management areas, but Indiana is the only one that is working to have a CISMA in nearly every county, explained Slack.
“We’re kind of a pilot program that other states are watching,” she said. “We’ve really brought this down to the county level because we want all of our citizens to be part of this.”
Now, more Hoosiers are signing up to combat invasives than ever.
Over 1,100 landowners have allowed CIMSA volunteers to inventory non-native plants on their property in order to remove them, totaling 43,000 surveyed acres.
A Purdue University study also found that half of nearly 600 woodland owners said they have been actively removing invasive plants for the last decade, according to Mo Zhou, associate professor of forest economics and management.
“From a private-spending perspective, people are definitely spending more now than before,” she said. “The awareness among landowners has definitely increased over the past decade.”
THE THREAT GROWS
That buy-in is more critical now than ever as climate change and globalization rapidly accelerate the spread of invasive plants across Indiana and the U.S.
A 2020 study by the Ecological Society of America found 80% of national parks surveyed in the eastern U.S. had at least one significant increase in the amount of invasives over time. Overall, the study found “considerably more increasing than decreasing trends” in the spread of non-native species.
In Indiana, the introduction of invasive plants is a source of “biological pollution” that threatens the state’s ecology, economy and health, according to the Indiana Department of Natural Resources Division of Fish and Wildlife.
Non-native species threaten to impact the $9.7 billion spent annually in the state on outdoor recreation like hunting and wildlife viewing, as well as Indiana’s $8 billion forest industry that employs over 38,000 people, the agency warned.
The National Invasive Species Council in 2016 said invasive species represent one of the most significant threats in the U.S. to ecosystems, human and animal health, infrastructure, the economy and cultural resources.
“Alarmingly, the threat is growing,” the council said in a report.
‘TURNING THE TIDE’
Indiana lawmakers and agencies have recently started taking the threat of invasives seriously.
In 2019, legislators approved a rule making it illegal to sell, gift, distribute or transport 44 of the most dangerous nonnative plants. Those who ignore the law could face a $500 fine every day for every plant. Nursery licenses can also be revoked.
The Indiana DNR in 2020 for the first time also established a statewide management plan to stop and prevent the spread invasive plants. The state determined bush honeysuckle, the plant removed from the park in Columbus, was the species of most concern.
Parts of that plan focus heavily on empowering and educating local residents to join in the fight. It also calls on state biologists to work closely with local nonprofit groups like CISMA management areas.
That kind of grassroots approach is new for Indiana, explained Slack with the Indiana Invasives Initiative. For decades, managing non-native plants has been left up to federal and state agencies that face limited staff and funding.
“They realize how limited they are and that their hands are tied in some aspects,” Slack said. “That’s why CISMAs are different. We take the tools and the information to the people and ask them to help us solve the challenge. That turns the tide.”
WASTED EFFORT?
Programs funded through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service offer Hoosier landowners financial incentives to control the spread of invasive species. Some will pay up to 70% of the cost of implementing a management plan.
That can provide much needed financial relief for what can be an expensive undertaking. Zhou with Purdue’s forestry division said it costs well over $500 an acre to manage nonnative plants. Yet only around 25% of the landowners who say they are removing invasives from their woodlands are utilizing the federal programs, she said. Most don’t know the funding exists.
“That means three-quarters are spending that money out of their own pocket,” Zhou said. “That can be a really financially or economically huge burden to the landowners.”
To really get people on board with removing invasives, the state needs to do a better job of enrolling more Hoosiers in federal programs, she argued.
Those programs also need to allocate long-term funding to property owners to encourage lifelong management of their land — otherwise non-native plants will simply grow back, Zhou explained.
“If you don’t follow up with management, really the money that was spent previously would be largely wasted,” she said. “Agencies should really consider more follow-up funding to ensure that the effect is sustained.”
That’s something volunteers with the Blazing Stars CISMA in Columbus are already doing. Once the group cleans out invasives from a park, they return for at least three years to remove any that might have popped up.
That’s another reason why local grassroots groups are so important and the most effective in the never-ending fight to stop the spread of non-native plants across Indiana, Slack said.
“It’s really important that that we’re here,” she said. “If our public doesn’t know about the problem — if they’re not allowed to be part of the solution — then they become apathetic.
“But I’m going to tell you, the public has been fantastic,” Slack added. “The citizens of Indiana have really raised their hand and said, ‘Look, this is important.’”
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