Screw the Natives—Well, Not Really
But I'm Really Over The Noise
Invasive Series – Part 4 - The Final Plunge
📝 Opinion| by Guy Saldiveri | March 17, 2026
For years—decades, really—gardeners, horticulturists, ecologists, and foresters have been arguing about native vs. non‑native vs. invasive. Not just in the U.S., but across continents. People are passionate about this topic, and their heels are dug in deeper than a pine tree’s taproot.
And here’s the thing: the native/non‑native designation doesn’t just shift from country to country. It shifts locally. Sometimes dramatically. As it turns out, the “Granite List” we treat as sacred might have been written by a guy who simply didn’t walk down your riverbank in 1815.
The Definition Problem (Again)
If you aren’t aware, the definition of invasive is simple: a non‑native species (meaning it wasn’t here before European settlement in the late 1400s–1500s) that is aggressive and damaging by nature.
Aggressive meaning it spreads quickly and seemingly uncontrollably. Damaging meaning it pushes out local species through various mechanisms and disrupts the surrounding fauna, flora, and insect populations.
People everywhere enjoy plants for their beauty, even when those plants are non‑native or aggressive — goldenrod is a perfect example. But enjoyment doesn’t change how countries classify them.
My take on this has always been the same: nature will find a way. Non‑native species—the ones that weren’t here before that arbitrary snapshot in time —will eventually slow down and stabilize in the environment. It may take a while, maybe even centuries, but it happens.
While most will agree on this point when pushed, they argue back—and at times vehemently—that the stabilization will not happen in our (their) lifetime. They also push back that the damage done to the local species of fauna, flora, and insects is irreparable.
On that one, well, I say deal with it. Your timeline is your timeline. I can't help you with that one. Nature works on a different scale and that's the one we need to use. Things will just have to evolve. You aren't putting the genie back in that bottle. Chinese tallow, English ivy, Tree of Heaven… they’re all naturalized. Whether they’re stabilized yet depends on which ecologist you corner.
And, I'm sorry, the one or two in my controlled back yard are not the ones causing the issues. If you think that new monoculture—of whatever—is due to my one specimen instead of the 200 others just hanging out over yonder then I don't know what to say. And, no, it wasn't my specimen that created the 200 others staring back at me.
It's the same for the other so-called invasives. They are here, they will continue to be here, and everything will just have to learn to coexist.
And if they don't learn to coexist—well, dinosaurs came and went, cavemen came and went, the Dodo bird came and went… See what I mean? Nature evolves. You had better evolve along with it, or you cease to exist. Yes, I understand the dinos were probably wiped out by an extraterrestrial event, but then again, maybe not…
The monarchs, the bees, the waxwings, some trees etc., they will be here 10,000 years from now or they won't be. Who's to say humans will even exist then? No proof of that either. With the way things are going, we could be gone in the next millennium and then this debate will be over—well, maybe…
The Snapshot in Time—and Why It’s a Mess
The late 1400s/early 1500s baseline is arbitrary at best.
First, only a fraction of plants were documented then. Second, most of that documentation happened in the Northeast. It wasn’t until the late 1700s and early 1800s that botanists even reached the rest of the country.
Are we really going to pretend we know exactly what was here before that? That nothing was missed? That no species were misclassified? That no seeds arrived by wind, water, birds, storms, or indigenous trade routes?
I find that hard to swallow.
And those Indigenous people—those folks were very active farmers, planters, colonizers, and traders. They moved just as many plants, spices, and artifacts around as we do today.
Indigenous North America was intentionally managed. Indigenous nations weren’t passive inhabitants of a wild continent.
They were active land managers, and their influence was enormous:
• Controlled burns maintained prairies, oak savannas, berry fields, and hunting grounds.
• These fires shaped plant communities for thousands of years.
• Many “native” ecosystems Europeans encountered were actually human‑designed ecological systems.
Large‑scale horticulture was common—people cultivated sunflowers, squash, goosefoot, tobacco, and dozens of regional crops. They transplanted useful plants closer to villages and trade routes.
They selectively encouraged species they valued—exactly what gardeners do today. They had a major impact on where plants live these days. And the biggest kicker there—NO documentation.
Something else to think about: Shift that snapshot 500 years earlier or later and the native list would look completely different. Honestly, it should look different right now based on what we know about how incomplete the early surveys were.
And that brings us to…
The "1824" Georgia Connection
Stephen Elliott’s A Sketch of the Botany of South Carolina and Georgia shaped the Southeastern “native list” more than almost anything else.
A few highlights:
• The 1824 text is known for many mistakes.
• Elliott was brilliant, but if he didn’t see a plant in the deep wilderness, he often assumed it was an “escape.”
• Modern DNA work shows many plants he labeled “introduced” were actually here for thousands of years.
• For 200 years, if Elliott didn’t see it, it didn’t make the list.
• If he saw it near a dock, it was “introduced.”
• If he saw it inland, it was “native.”
This is where “scientific opinion” quietly became “ecological law.”
Our native lists are based on the travel itinerary of a few men with notebooks. How much more arbitrary can it get?
Natural vs. Unnatural—According to Whom?
So if they classified things as they got to them, then a plant they found in Arizona might have appeared there maybe 100 years before they found it. Maybe a bird ate a seed from a tree in northern Mississippi, decided to take a bit of a vacation, tossed all care to the wind and decided to head out west instead of south. Maybe once it was there, it left a little deposit that is now a thriving forest.
How do we know? I mean it was there before we got there right? I know—DNA. Well, DNA research does change the list, but not always in the direction you might think.
Sorry, not trying to be sarcastic here—but I'm having difficulty trying to reconcile my apprehension and skepticism with all this non-scientific methodology.
So, where are we now?
How 'bout we touch back on some common distinctions.
Native vs. Non-native: A species is non-native (or introduced) if it was brought to an area by human activity, whether intentionally or accidentally. But if brought in by bird poop, wind, mastodon, kangaroo, or any other means and was present prior to that now ~300 year classification period it's native. Because that was accidentally on purpose I guess…
The Rule: If a bird carries a seed from Mexico to Georgia, it’s a "natural range expansion."
The Reality: If a human carries that same seed in their pocket, it’s an "introduction."
Native vs. Invasive: While most native species are beneficial, "invasive" refers to non-native species that cause significant ecological or economic harm.
Yeah, and my Carolina jasmine is native by the skin of its teeth, and if it had been found a little later, it would be considered one of the most aggressive plants on the planet. Oh, that means it would be on that invasive list—maybe even higher up than tallow—yet instead, it’s a state flower.
Historical Baselines: In the United States, many conservation groups like Audubon and the National Wildlife Federation define "native" as species that were present prior to European colonization. Yeah, my Snapshot in time...
And wait just a sec here, I've just now come across something else. This arbitrary snapshot in time. This cutoff, this solid, indestructible list that is carved in granite, it’s actually a fluctuating entity. Almost alive, changing at the whim of—oh—we were wrong here—we were wrong there—we need to fix that quick—Shhh don't tell anyone…
So the actual list is in flux. It's updatable—meaning it has things that drop off and things that are added… Did I mention the word "arbitrary?"
I remember traveling cross-county one time. Heading into California. Now there's a state that has some tough guidelines for plants. I actually went through an agricultural checkpoint. The guards wanted to know if I had any vegetation in the vehicle with me. I assumed they were talking about live plants, not some dried out weed I found lying around somewhere….[joking there]
I told them I didn't and they waved me on through.
I thought about that afterwards, and wondered what if I had a colony of fire ants living in the spare‑tire compartment of my car? They never checked for that. Honestly, I haven’t looked at that spare tire in so long that Jimmy Hoffa could be back there and I’d never know.
Makes me wonder about the whole, "how it came here narrative." I mean, a car is a lot smaller than a woolly mammoth, how many hitchhikers did those ancient blimps lug around unnoticed?
It made me think about how some species came here as well. I constantly pull weeds, oak trees, crepe myrtles, tallow, pines, jasmine, etc. out of my containers. I love the plants; I just don't want them where they are currently growing.
Easy fix, just pull them out, but what about that hitchhiker vine that was hiding in that lush plant that was actually brought over. Isn't that just as natural as a bird depositing a seed 400 miles away?
People say human‑driven change is different because of the speed of which we instigate the change. But, humans are nature too. We’re not an alien species dropped from the sky. We’re an organism doing what organisms do: moving things, reshaping environments, and creating new selection pressures. Evolution doesn’t care whether a seed traveled in a bird’s gut or a human’s pocket—it only cares what survives.
The Glacial Reset Button
After the last ice age—roughly 10–12,000 years ago—North America was basically a blank slate. Everything here migrated from somewhere else. South America, Central America, the Caribbean… seeds moved, species spread, and ecosystems rebuilt themselves.
That's a long time in human time, but still a burp in geological time—and actually pretty darn fast for all the vegetation we have across the continent. Granted, maybe not as quickly as us (non-native) humans can move stuff around, but pretty darn quick considering.
So if we’re being honest, most of our “native North American plants” are actually “native South American plants” that moved north as the ice retreated. Or more specifically, species recolonized from southern refugia after the last glacial maximum.
But sure—let’s pretend the 1500s were the magical cutoff.
People say insects evolved alongside these plants for 10,000 years—but that’s not how evolution works. Plants and insects recolonized at different speeds, from different places, and most insects aren’t specialists anyway. If they can adapt to plants that arrived 10,000 years ago, they can adapt to ones that arrived 300 years ago.
And those specialists? Well, those are actually the weak links in the whole chain. They’re the ones that truly need to evolve in order to keep up. Maybe that monarch won’t disappear at all—maybe it’ll turn into a super-monarch capable of devouring that nasty tallow tree. I mean, who knows…
The Meme Problem (and the Virginia Creeper Example)
A lot of what I write on this subject gets its kick-start because of memes and information I see sent around on social media and through other avenues. So much of the information passed around is widely accepted as fact and also embraced as gospel because of the origination point.
Take this for instance:
A meme telling people to not plant English ivy because, it's non-native, highly invasive, and takes over. It spreads rapidly, chokes out trees, forms thick dense ground cover that nothing else can penetrate. What they recommend you plant instead—are you ready?—Virginia creeper.
I think I spit out my coffee when I saw that. Yes, Virginia creeper, because it's a native vine and by definition CANNOT be classified as invasive.
But according to the University of California:
In our area, Virginia creeper should be considered an undesirable species in landscapes. If you are offered it as a pass-along plant, decline as graciously as you can. Be firm, however. You don't want this plant. In a dry location it's not too bad of a plant if you don't mind the huge leafhopper infestation that arrives in summer. With water it becomes a real beast with few redeeming qualities.
Very fast-growing, often adding 10 to 20 feet of length in a single growing season once established. Mature plants can easily reach 30 to 50 feet high with a wide spread, frequently covering buildings or trees, according to the NC Extension Gardener Plant Toolbox.
Potential Concerns:
• Damage: The adhesive discs can damage paint or mortar on older buildings.
• Toxicity: The berries contain poisonous oxalic acid.
• Aggression: It can be very aggressive, requiring regular pruning to manage its spread.
And from the University of Florida:
It’s Important Value: Virginia Creeper is one of our vines of mistaken identity. This vine seemingly pops up throughout our natural areas and many times people confuse it with Poison Ivy. In fact, when utilized properly, Virginia Creeper can be a beautiful ornamental vine for a landscape because it can easily be trained to trellises and provides beautiful fall color. Like all our native vines, Virginia Creeper provides shelter and food sources for scores of wildlife throughout the state, especially birds.
The Concern: Virginia Creeper is an aggressive grower and pops up everywhere – which causes people to refer to it as invasive, but it is important to note that no native plant can be invasive. Within our ornamental landscapes and agricultural production, it can be considered a nuisance because it pops up in our shrubs, trees, groundcovers, etc. In situations within our landscapes, Virginia Creeper can cover, smother, and overwhelm some of our smaller landscape plant material.
Recommendation: Complete eradication of this vine is very difficult. Hand-pulling the weeds when they are young is helpful but isn’t fully effective as result of the vine’s extensive root system. If hand removing this vine is already part of your landscape maintenance – perfect. Herbicide treatment is possible, but will also take multiple applications for complete control. Building hand-pulling Virginia Creeper can help keep the population minimal and manageable for homeowners, so it will not proliferate excessively.
You caught that right? It isn't just me seeing this is it?
Now, I have 5 different English ivy plants on my back patio. All of which are in containers, all of which are very well behaved, and none of them have ever spread or given me cause for concern.
Going by the above guidelines, I should abandon my seemingly well-behaved non-native invasive plants in favor of a native that is sure to take over and turn my patio into a jungle.
I think I'll stick with my version of insanity.
And here’s the part I keep circling back to: this debate isn’t going anywhere. People will argue about “native purity” for centuries, and there still won’t be a winner. Nature isn’t taking sides. It doesn’t care about our categories, our timelines, or our granite‑carved lists. Time moves, ecosystems shift, species adapt, and nature keeps going.
No matter how hard someone tries—how much they pull, preach, or panic—no one can control nature. They’ve never been able to, and they never will.
Look, we spend billions of dollars and millions of gallons of poison trying to keep the world looking like a 19th‑century painting. Maybe it's time we stop trying to be the museum curators of the forest and start trusting the 4.5 billion years of trial‑and‑error that got us here in the first place.
After all, as I've said before, what better artist is there than nature herself. Give her that blank canvas, all the paint she needs, and let her splash it around as she sees fit.
I'll just kick back, put my feet up, and enjoy the breathtaking view.
📌 This essay is part of my Invasive Series
Four essays, one big question: What do we really mean by “native”?
As always—Happy Gardening 🌱
Comments
Post a Comment