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Seedlings of Change
Retailers Drop Invasive Species
Starting this spring, shoppers at Meijer, a Midwestern chain of home and garden centers, can purchase for their yards regionally native plants such as purple coneflower, red bud and silver maple.
In a groundbreaking partnership, The Nature Conservancy helped Meijer select 119 trees, shrubs and perennials that will carry a new “Recommended Non-Invasive” tag, along with the Conservancy’s logo. The stores will also remove two invasives from their inventories: the Norway maple and Lombardy poplar.
In Florida, the Conservancy and the Southeast and Florida Exotic Pest Plant councils also have partnered with the Lowe’s chain, which has agreed not to sell 45 species of invasive plants in their garden centers in that state.
Reducing sales of invasives could make a big difference in slowing their spread. Invasives cause an estimated $20 billion in damage each year. “Approximately 60 percent of invasive plant species in many areas have come from intentional plantings, such as in people’s gardens or from public works projects,” says Valerie Vartanian, of the Conservancy’s Global Invasive Species Initiative.
Meijer is launching an in-store campaign at its garden centers in Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio to help prevent the spread of invasive plants from back yards to natural areas. Signs, videos, audio announcements and brochures will educate shoppers on the benefits of native and noninvasive plants, and Conservancy scientists will train garden center staff to answer questions.
“We hope that Meijer’s thoughtful approach moves the market, so that there’s less demand for some of the invasive plants,” says Helen Taylor, state director of the Conservancy’s Michigan chapter. “We also hope this project gives us the track record and data to prove to others in the industry that removing invasives from the shelf is an economically feasible strategy. It’s our fantasy to inspire other retail chains, because they’re a definite point where invasives get out there, and we could intercept them.”
John Legge, who directs the Conservancy work in western Michigan, agrees: “We have the rare opportunity to make a difference with invasives before they’re so far gone that you can’t put the genie back in the bottle.”
—Jennifer Uscher
Nature picture credits (top to bottom, left to right): Photo © George Doyle/Stockbyte Platinum/Getty Images (Gardener); © The Nature Conservancy (Tag)
