Season 4 Preview and Invasives 101

Abigail: 00:00

Hello, everyday environment listeners. Abigail here. This episode is a little different than our normal preview episode. You'll hear from your favorite hosts to give you a preview of season four, and then stick around for the second half where we give you an episode from the archives for a 101 on the topic for this season. Welcome to another episode of the Everyday Environment Podcast where we explore the environment we see every day.

Abigail: 00:28

And today, we are joined by the whole Everyday Environment podcast team. Welcome, everyone.

Amy: 00:33

Woo hoo.

Erin: 00:34

Yay.

Abigail: 00:35

This is our preview episode for season four. We are really excited to just kinda kick off the season, the spring 2026 season to give everybody a little context of what year we're in, maybe some timely things get brought up, who knows? And so, we just thought we'd give you all a little preview of what's going on, what we're talking about, and then, there might be a little special second part to this episode. So stay tuned to listen to see what that might be.

Abigail: 01:00

Let's get started with just everyone reintroducing ourselves in case this is a listener's first time introducing themselves to everyday environment. So Amy, I'll have you go first.

Amy: 01:11

I'm representing West Central Illinois. Amy Lefringhouse . Woo hoo. No. Just kidding, everybody.

Amy: 01:18

I do. I come from Quincy, Illinois is where I record. So I'm over here on the West Central Side of the state. And, yeah, happy to be back this season.

Abigail: 01:29

And what do you do for extension?

Amy: 01:31

Well, yes, Abigail. I forgot to mention that. I'm a natural resources educator, like Erin, and covering Adams, Brown, Hancock, Pike and Schuylar Counties over here. So I always tell my students and some kids that I talk to about careers that I talk to a lot of people and help people solve their problems about the three w's, more than just the three w's, but I talk about their woods, their wildlife, and their water. That's how I always say it to to the youngsters when I'm talking to them about careers.

Abigail: 02:05

yeah. Oh, I love it. I'm never gonna forget that now. Woods, wildlife, and water.

Erin: 02:10

Perfect. Well, elevator speech.

Amy: 02:12

Yeah. Exactly. There's a lot more to it, but it they can they can remember that.

Abigail: 02:17

Yeah. Alright, Erin. Go ahead. Tell us about yourself.

Erin: 02:21

Alright. So I am Erin Garrett, and I am based in Southernmost Illinois. So I'm recording in Metropolis, home of Superman, right across the river from Kentucky. And like Amy said, I'm also a natural resources educator, and I cover five counties also, but Alexander, Johnson, Union, Massac, and Pulaski Counties.

Abigail: 02:46

Alright. And a little bit about me, I'm Abigail Garofalo. I'm the Illinois State Master Naturalist Coordinator. I'm talking to you from Des Plaines, Illinois, so the Northwest Suburbs Of Chicago. I kinda cover that part of the state, but I actually my job covers the whole part of the state, I serve everyone, all things Master Naturalists, and yeah, I just love working with this team here.

Erin: 03:12

I love it. Abigail's gotten a new role since we last recorded, so congrats to you.

Abigail: 03:19

The team is back. Last season, we didn't have Erin with us. She had a baby, and now she's back recording the whole season with us, season four, which is pretty great. So we are excited. We actually have been doing this podcast for two years, so it's been pretty great.

Abigail: 03:37

We take breaks between those seasons too, so it just feels like it's been so long, but also so short. So what have you all been up to on our little hiatus of of recording and and podcasting and talking to Illinoisans?

Amy: 03:52

Well, I traveled down to the area to a conference in Southern Illinois, so I got to go down and see Erin and explore Southern Illinois or Southernmost Illinois and see all the cool natural spaces or natural landscapes that are down there that are like way unique and way different than anywhere else in the state. And I talk about some of those in my everyday observations throughout the season. So yeah, it was a great time. Last fall I was down there and it was beautiful and can't wait to go back down there again and see the things that I didn't get to.

Erin: 04:33

It was great having you down, Amy. And a lot of other nature minded folks down at It was great to have people come and experience Southern Illinois because there's so much to offer. So

Amy: 04:46

Mhmm. Absolutely. What about you, Erin? What do you do?

Erin: 04:51

Well, since I last recorded with you all, like I said, I had a baby. I was So spending time with my daughter over the summer, I was off work during that time, spring summer, and then came back and work was a whirlwind as it usually is. But one of the fun things that we did was start a new program all about woolly bear caterpillars and seemed to take it everywhere. So it's nearly all of our communities across the state. If folks saw myself and my coworker, Anne, you probably saw us with a woolly bear caterpillar replica, and that was really super fun, and we're excited to continue that moving forward this year.

Erin: 05:36

So just a fun time of babies and then caterpillars, you know, other babies. It was great.

Amy: 05:44

The theme of your break was babies and caterpillars.

Abigail: 05:49

I'm like, watch out season five, woolly bears. That's the

Erin: 05:52

Exactly. We can do it. Just

Abigail: 05:56

woolly bears. That's it. That that's it.

Amy: 05:59

That'd be cool.

Amy: 06:01

Oh, too funny. What about you, Abigail?

Abigail: 06:03

Well, I actually I had another baby, so now I I was a mom of two, last you all talked to me, now I'm a mom of three, and so y'all will hear I talk about my kids a lot, I feel like, in my everyday observations, because kids just see the world a little differently a little bit, or maybe they kinda make fun of me a little bit for seeing the world a little differently. I left, actually, like, at the last month of last season, so I didn't get to finish Wildlife with you all, which was kind of a bummer, but I got to listen to them every week while I was on break, and so that was a nice way to stay connected with everybody, and it's it's been good. So I'm glad to be back, glad to be here. I'm glad to be supporting the Master Naturalists across the state now that I'm back. So

Amy: 06:43

Just wait till you have teenagers. They really make fun of how we see the world differently. You know, my teenagers are like, oh, there's my mom over there looking at trees. Oh, there's my mom doing a Can you believe she goes around and she drives around and she counts birds and puts them tallies them, you know, and the sheet They just think it's the funniest thing, so just wait. More to come.

Abigail: 07:08

Yes. You know what? I strive to be that mother. I honestly want to be the weird mom who stops to listen to the birds, to find to got her nose in the grass trying to find that mushroom. Let's do it. Walks with me are not fast. They are slow.

Erin: 07:26

For sure.

Abigail: 07:27

So great. Well, like I had mentioned, we started this two years ago, two lifetimes ago. We've covered climate change, we've covered water, we've color covered wildlife. And now in season four, we have a brand new topic we are covering this spring. Erin, why don't you tell us all about what we're covering this season?

Erin: 07:45

Okay. Drumroll, please.

Erin: 07:47

Thank you, Abigail.

Erin: 07:49

This season, we're covering invasive species. We have talked about invasives on the podcast before. We know it's a hot topic in the natural resource world and there's a lot of information, lot of resources out there. So you might think that you know all there is to know about invasives, but let me tell you, your mind will be blown.

Erin: 08:11

We learned so much about invasives this season, things that I didn't know, and, you know, my background is in invasives, and I was just constantly blown away by the new things that are out there, the new ways that we share information, that we learn about invasives, like the level of detail that we can get down to. It's really fascinating. So I think we've got a really good lineup of guest speakers who have been on the pod and the blog, and it's just it's a really, really great season. So lots to look forward to for sure.

Amy: 08:48

Think it was cool this season. We kinda reached out outside of Illinois several for several different guests this year. So just lending their expertise and their perspective to, you know, outside of Illinois and how lots of different states and and lots of different areas are studying invasives in different ways and and creating tools for us to use and creating, you know, a a deeper body of knowledge when it comes to invasive species. So that's kind of a that's a neat takeaway for this season.

Abigail: 09:22

Mhmm. Yeah. And we really wanted to I remember when we were first started planning this season, we were like, man, is this topic overdone? Right? Like, was the first question we all asked ourselves because Chris Evans, which you all know is a friend of the pod, has been working with us, and he does a lot of invasive content, it's a very popular topic.

Abigail: 09:43

There's the invasive species symposium that Extension runs in May, and so in Champaign. And so we were like, man, is this like something that like are we really producing fresh content? Is this something the public wants? And it really led us to asking more questions about, well, like, what isn't being talked about beyond just, like, this species in the woods? Right?

Abigail: 10:06

Like and so we really started focusing a lot on a lot of different aspects, like communication across groups and, like, proper monitoring and and reporting as opposed to just, like, how do you get rid of invasives or, you know, what invasives are out there? We were looking at, like, more kind of, like, fringe topics that unless you're like real nerdy about it, you don't get to talk about, but show so much value I felt. Like I again, Erin and Amy are saying like blowing my mind the whole time.

Abigail: 10:36

I was just like, woah, and like these are things that we should all know about and so it's just really, really cool, the work that's being done.

Erin: 10:43

Definitely. My challenge for listeners this season is to see if Chris Evans' name is mentioned in every single episode, because I think we come close. Yeah. Because everyone in the invasive world knows Chris and he helped connect us with a lot of our speakers today, but it was just funny because it seemed like in every episode, every his name comes up and everyone's like, oh, yeah. I know Chris. So let us know. Yeah. You did all all the episodes? Did we miss a few?

Abigail: 11:15

what are we all most excited about? Any sneak peeks we wanna offer our audience?

Amy: 11:21

I have one. We have a new kingdom that kind of entered the chat during this season. We have a grad student or a PhD student from University of Wisconsin talking to us, and she brings in the fungi kingdom into our conversation and focuses on the golden oyster mushroom. And so if there are any fungi, you know, crazed folks out there that love to learn about mushrooms and things like that that like to go on forays in the woods, tune into that episode. She does a great job, you know, talking about this mushroom that we really didn't know a lot about before we talked to her.

Amy: 12:10

Ashwariya Virabahu talks to us, and she was just great. She was a great breaks down, you know, what is golden oyster mushroom, what how it got here, what we're seeing out there in the woods. So yeah. We usually talk about plants, you know, invasive species.

Amy: 12:26

Like, plants come first to mind because we're doing a lot of management and awareness around invasive plants. We might talk a little bit about invasive wildlife. I know Joy O'Keefe is gonna talk to us about invasive wildlife, but we really hadn't ever been in into, you know, been have talked about fungi. So it was kinda cool to to look at that

Abigail: 12:53

Yea and even if you are not a "fun guy" you gotta bring the puns going. Come on. Then it's still like, we give a little like, fungus one zero one, right? Because that's not like exactly the as a familiar of a kingdom to our audience as well, and yeah, that was a really cool episode. Mhmm.

Erin: 13:19

I'm excited to listen to it. Mhmm. Yeah. For me, it seems like the topics that, by the title, you might not think will be super fascinating were amazing. So things like regulations, still fascinating. Genetics,

Amy: 13:40

regulations is Chris Evans. You just want everybody to know that. Mhmm.

Erin: 13:44

We do bring him on.

Abigail: 13:45

You think it's gonna be boring, just look who the guest is. Exactly.

Erin: 13:51

But for me, the genetics episode was just mind boggling. The level of detail we can get down to to see where these invasives in our woods are coming from, like from the horticulture industry, like what strains of cultivars, and they all acted differently and that's what was crazy is it was like species by species differences and just super super fascinating. So when it comes to the genetics episode, definitely get ready, and I feel like I need to go listen to it again and take notes, because I forgot all the details, but I know it was just like, it was so cool.

Abigail: 14:33

I just finished editing that episode, and it is like so I'll just like preview for the audience. If you wanna know like the story of like Buckthorn, of Winter Creeper, of Miscanthus , of Callery Pear, like all of those are different escapees into the wild kind of aspect, and the it's just it's super cool. I believe we ended the episode saying we have to, like, stop recording because our minds are too blown. Like, we we we can't talk anymore because we just there's too much to process. It was so good.

Abigail: 15:06

So definitely check that one out for sure. Mhmm. Mhmm. And the one that made me feel like the most, I guess, hopeful? Like that I was like, wow, this is so cool, and like, just like, everyone's like in it trying to do good things was the ones where we saw like cross collaborations between orgs.

Abigail: 15:24

So like EdMaps was one of them when we talked about how to report invasive species and all the data that they're pulling from and how it's being used and just like, that is the kind of tool that I think of that all of us on the ground are like, wow, we wish this existed, but that that's too big, it's never gonna get off the ground, it'll never go anywhere, and it actually exists. It's being used and it's really successful and effective. Like, that's the dream, and that's so I just got a little chills thinking about it. Mhmm. And then the other one is the, like, the public gardens as sentinels for invasive species.

Abigail: 16:00

Like, that one was also really cool because again, just like a great example of, people working across, like, different groups, different people, different like, not countries, but different spaces, and doing that for the good of the public, and the good of the environment, and all of those aspects because like it's only beneficial to everyone. So it's like these kinds of networks that we all are like, wouldn't it be great if this existed? And it's like they actually exist, and so that's really, really cool. If And you need a little bit of joy because invasive species can feel really downtrodden, as well as blow your mind by them, these make me feel like really good about it because I'm just like, yeah. We're doing the work. Good stuff.

Amy: 16:41

So. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like well, especially for EDDMapS, obviously, you you know, it gives you a little bit of a task, you know, that you can do and a tool that you can use individually and you can contribute to work of, you know, monitoring these species. So it just gives you, like you said, hope, Abigail, that you can actually make a contribution to the work in in Basins.

Erin: 17:14

And we hear stories of how individual contributions were, like, responded to right away. So that's like, right? You enter data and you think, oh, it's it's like off into the internet world. Right? Like, how is is it actually used?

Erin: 17:29

And it's like, someone got an alert and immediately went out to like eradicate the species. You're like, wow, like that's crazy.

Abigail: 17:37

Like, it's how it's supposed to work, it's like Exactly. It's like, everything feels so, like, stuck in bureaucracy these days of like, you know, I report it and it sits in an email for three or four days, and then, you know, like, but this, like, really showed me that it's like, that's not true. Like, that have like, we can do things quickly and effectively, and that's cool. Guess so. Mhmm.

Abigail: 18:00

Well, awesome. Is there anything else that we should know about this season that we want our audience to know?

Amy: 18:06

Well, I wanted to highlight, we do have our short videos that we put out throughout our season are usually or will have been historically, you know, really popular. Lots of people have viewed lots of people viewed our teeny tiny wildlife videos that we had last last season. And this season, we have some more that we're highlighting, some species that we're highlighting, some really creative ways of of teaching folks about different species of invasives and things like that. So those are always fun to come up with, ideas to come up with about how we're gonna, you know, reach those of you in the audience and spread, you know, awareness about invasive species. So look for those fun videos coming out this season again.

Abigail: 18:52

And then we have a webinar in March. Right? What day is that?

Erin: 18:55

March 19.

Abigail: 18:57

So check us out March There's a webinar on invasive wildlife.

Abigail: 19:03

I feel like we often talk about, like, invasive plants. So this is like a really cool like I said, we were looking for, like, the different angles, something that you all don't usually get exposure to. So talking exclusively about invasive wildlife, and that's from our very own Joy O'Keefe, and she's pretty awesome too. Great present great presenter, really interesting content.

Abigail: 19:21

So check that out. Register, and we'll also have the recording up too if you can't make it that day as well.

Erin: 19:28

I'll just add three more words, cosplay for science. If you wanna learn more, listen to the podcast. Again, so inspiring and really unique, and that's all I'm gonna say. You have to listen.

Abigail: 19:42

I only got to I didn't get to be in on that one, so I'm like, I'm so excited. So, Alright. Well, thank you Amy and Erin for taking the time to chat about this new season. I think it's gonna be really, really fun. I'm excited.

Abigail: 19:59

This has been another episode of the Everyday Environment podcast. Check us out next week for our first episode of season four where we talk with a member of the Everyday Environment team that you all don't really get to see very much. Our own Emily Steele as she talks all about communications around invasives, and then we have also a special feature from the field with Phil Anderson on cosplay and invasives.

Abigail: 20:33

Heads up listeners. You're about to listen to an episode from the archives before the team had our whole audio and podcasting situation figured out.

Abigail: 20:40

The full episode talks about spotted lanternfly and then has Chris Evans to give a 101 on invasive species. You're about to listen to the second half where we just give this invasive species 101 part. It may sound a little tinny, but the information is awesome and gives you a great primer for season four. Check out the show notes for a link to the full episode.

Abigail: 21:11

Welcome to another episode of Spotlight on Natural Resources where we shine some light on what's going on in your environment. I'm your host, Abigail Garofalo.

Erin: 21:20

And I'm your cohost, Erin Garrett.

Abigail: 21:22

And today, we have actually a little special edition of the podcast. We are here with Chris Evans, the forestry extension and research specialist with University of Illinois Extension.

Chris: 21:33

Yeah. Happy to be here.

Abigail: 21:34

Alright. Chris, you're in the hot seat now. Tell us about invasive no. I'll I'll be more specific.

Abigail: 21:42

What is what is an invasive species? We've been talking all about, you know, the spotted lanternfly, but I think some people need even a little more information backed up even further to say, like, what the heck is an invasive, and why is it a problem? So, you know, give us your first little pitch of Sure. Sure. What it is.

Chris: 22:01

Absolutely. So invasive, the term invasive, I use it very selective selectively. Right? I use it to as a definition or or a descriptor for an organism, and it could be a plant, it could be an insect like we're talking about, or whatever, any kind of organism that's not naturally found in that given area. So for Illinois, it could be something that wasn't here nationally, either didn't evolve here or it didn't move here on its own.

Chris: 22:28

It's just not a normal part of our ecosystem. And the fact that it is now in this new ecosystem, it's in this landscape, there's doing the it's doing some kind of, it's it's altering the landscape some way in a negative manner. Right? So its presence there's consequences for its presence on the landscape that is that is that we deem negative. So that could be that there's some kind of ecological damage.

Chris: 22:52

Right? We we it's hurting some of our species like emerald ash borer. It could be a financial damage because it's costing us more to manage something. It could be a human health issue like giant hogweed. There's a lot of of ways it can be, but it kinda has to be a negative consequence of it being there for us to kinda call it an invasive.

Abigail: 23:12

Now can can the negative consequence be it's just annoying, like the dandelion in my front yard, or is that something different?

Chris: 23:21

You're gonna get different answers for different folks. Right? And so I'm interested to hear what Erin thinks as well. But for me, I think, no. That wouldn't be an invasive.

Chris: 23:30

I think it has to be some more serious level of of, and I think, environmental or ecological damage is the the key. Right? There's something that it's altering in our ecosystems that's negative before it needs to be invasive. So a dandelion in your yard may be annoying to you, but that's in a an artificial kind of yard that's already full of non native grasses anyway. So to me, that's not an invasive.

Chris: 23:53

Right? I don't know. Erin, what do you think?

Erin: 23:56

Oh, I definitely agree. I think sometimes we overuse the term invasive, and that really, like you said, should be reserved for ones where we should kind of prioritize our management efforts rather than just trying to get rid of every nonnative plant because it is nonnative. Right? When some are many of them, most of them, right, are fine and aren't going to really cause a huge amount of damage or harm in the long term.

Chris: 24:22

Yep. And and I hear that term used a lot with native species. Right? Oh Yeah. Red cedar is the worst invasive or poison ivy is so invasive or ragweed.

Chris: 24:31

And to me, that's not the case. Right? Yeah. They may be out of whack a little bit, and there may be something that is annoying to us, but it's not necessarily invasive in the sense that it's not this organism that's coming from somewhere else and changing the the ecology. It's just something that's naturally part of that system that's changed just to to something else or it's something we just don't like.

Chris: 24:52

Right? And so there's very, very very big difference in my mind between native organisms that we may wanna manage at some level versus a true non native invasive.

Erin: 25:03

Alright. So if we go back to just invasive species in general, and we talked a little bit about how spotted lanternfly got here, but what are some other ways that these invasives arrive in The US?

Chris: 25:16

Sure. You know, there's kinda two big categories I think you can lump that. Right? There's accidental and intentional. And so a lot of our really bad invasives, especially invasive plants, unfortunately, were intentionally introduced here.

Chris: 25:29

Right? So think of multiflora rose as an example or or autumn olive or things like that. Back in the day, the kind of leading thought with conservation was, the more diversity the better kind of regardless of where that diversity came from. So people wanted to introduce new species intentionally. We wanted to bring them over because we the thought was they provided some level of of benefit in adding, you know, enhancing our our landscape.

Chris: 25:57

And so if you look at, like, multiflora rose, it was introduced as as, you know, for agriculture, as a living fence to put up in your in your lands to contain your cattle, or was, you know, a reclamation plant because it grows well in poor soils and it was a wildlife plant, and so forth and so on. So there's a lot of things that have been introduced for agriculture, for horticulture because they're beautiful plant. Or, you know, erosion control or or some of these other wildlife and some of these other causes. So that's one big category. Right?

Chris: 26:32

Intentional, we introduce them. I often call, I've said it a bunch, but the the intentional introduction of promotion of species like multifloros and bush honeysuckle is one of the largest conservation mistakes ever in in North America. I really think it is. So that's one way. The other way is accidental, and they're hitchhikers.

Chris: 26:51

Right? So things like Japanese stiltgrass, it came in there, they think, just as packing material, and it wasn't intended to be introduced. Emerald ash borer was brought in, they think, in wood packing material, you know, dunnage or crates and just kinda hitched a ride. And so I think those are kinda both of the ways that invasives will get here. Once they arrive in The US, then they move a whole bunch of other ways, you know, water, people, things that we've already talked about here too.

Abigail: 27:19

And, you know, sometimes we're introducing, but these plants that either get unintentionally or intentionally or organisms in general that get introduced, do they all become invasive?

Chris: 27:31

No. Not at all. In fact, the vast majority of introduced organisms don't have any suitability to even survive in Illinois. Right? So you think of tropical plants that get introduced or seeds from tropical plants or or even, you know, pathogens or whatever that are from a different climate, they're just not gonna survive here.

Chris: 27:48

Right? And in fact, it's a tiny, tiny percentage that are even have the ability to survive and and reproduce in Illinois, and it's a tiny percentage of those that can kinda form these free living populations and then a tiny percentage of those that cause a lot of ecological damage. So I think the numbers say that it's something like one in a thousand, you know, plants that end up getting introduced into, you know, causing some level of damage to be called invasive. So it's a tiny, tiny percentage. The problem is the ones that do can be really impactful.

Chris: 28:18

Right? Just think about how many acres in Illinois are covered in Bush honeysuckle. You know, it's thousands upon thousands.

Abigail: 28:24

Most common woody species in the Chicago Wilderness region is buckthorn.

Chris: 28:30

Yep. There you go.

Abigail: 28:31

I was just looking at, like, 40% of trees Illinois, that area. It's it's a crazy number. Yeah.

Erin: 28:38

we already talked a little bit about how invasives affect natural areas. So when we talk about us as homeowners, you know, residents of Illinois, how do invasives affect us?

Chris: 28:51

It's a good question. There's one, it's that's, you know, this is not like a monolithic group, right? Invasives affect things in different ways. There's quite a few invasives that do have some level of human health issue, right? And so think about poison hemlock, right?

Chris: 29:06

So poison hemlock can kill you, that'll affect anybody. If you ingest it, there's other ones that'll cause rashes, There's other ones that are allergens. You know, there's a bunch of different things like that. So I think anybody on the landscape can be impacted by some of these species that are if they get, you know, in contact with some of these human health issues. Others, I mean, it just impacts our whole environment, right, whether that is reducing diversity in your county, maybe even reducing diversity on your land, something like jumping worms might actually impact your yard.

Chris: 29:40

So I think, you know, if you look at what whatever scale you're talking about, any homeowner, any landowner in Illinois, if they've got any bit of natural area, may see impacts from invasive species moving in there. But if not, if you somebody that likes to fish or likes to hunt, likes to birdwatch, likes to hike, or just enjoy any bit of nature in Illinois, we know that there's invasive species that could impact those and reduce our diversity or or impact the ability to walk through the woods because they're just so thick. Right? So I think I personally consider anybody that lives in Illinois are could be greatly affected by invasive species.

Abigail: 30:16

Definitely. I had a a naturalist who was really like, it found what she was doing so important because she loved the birds so much, and she, like, had found out how, like, buckthorn is a diuretic for birds. It's actually not giving them any nutrition when they're eating it because at first, she was like, why are people tearing down the forest? Like, and so now she, like, really understands and sees that, like, wow. Like, this is really bad.

Abigail: 30:41

Like, I want to have plants that are beneficial for the birds and not just that look like they are. And so there's more going on there, and it really, like you said, depends on the the species of invasive and how its ecology is with that local ecosystem.

Chris: 30:55

Oh, absolutely. And it's, you know, it's tough. Right? I agree. You're going out there.

Chris: 30:59

You may be using heavy machinery or using herbicides, and it's it can be confusing to people why we do that. Right? Or think we're hurting things. But, it's been tough for me even, like, learn the more I learn about invasive species, the more invasive species I know, you know, it it can be depressing. You get out on the landscape, and you're like, I don't see a native species around here, or you just constantly see the same invasive over and over again.

Chris: 31:23

You know, it does impact your, kinda quality of of your hike or the your, enjoyment of things. And so it's kind of a mixed blessing knowing about all these species, and it kinda get you know, sometimes ignorance is bliss. Right?

Abigail: 31:39

Man, you must be the worst to go on a hike with, Chris.

Chris: 31:42

Oh oh, no. I have learned my lesson. So my wife has said, alright. We hike with people. I just don't mention that stuff.

Chris: 31:49

Just let us enjoy it, and I can just, you know, fume inside when I see that bush honeysuckle. So I try to tone it down a little bit. Yeah.

Erin: 31:58

Same. My parents are like, we can't. And I was like, look at this beautiful plant. I'm like, oh, it's invasive. They're like, okay. We don't wanna hear it anymore. This is the place we hike all the time. Well, the more you know. Right?

Chris: 32:12

There we go.

Abigail: 32:13

Too funny. I mean, I feel like you pretty much broke it down for us why we should care about invasives. So, you know, what do I what do I do about it?

Chris: 32:20

What do you do about invasives?

Abigail: 32:21

Yeah. What do I do? I'm I wanna care. I I feel inspired, Chris, by the words that you've shared and got out the spotted lanternfly, and now I wanna know what can I do?

Chris: 32:32

Fantastic. That's the best question ever. I think there you can get involved. And so there's a lot of different ways to get involved. One would be get those invasive plants that are in your landscaping out of there.

Chris: 32:46

Right? And so some of the ones that are still being planted, still see around, burning bush, Japanese barberry, Bradford callery pear, Bradford pear, whatever you want to call those flowering pears, all of those are still being used, right, you see them in people's yards. If that's you, you know, you may want to consider replacing those with something that's non invasive or even better native, right, in there. I think that's a simple step that any of us can do. Other than that, you know, volunteer.

Chris: 33:13

Volunteer at your local, County Conservation Board or Forest Preserve District. Get involved with the Master Naturalist Program. Some of these places, they are just really, really in need of assistance controlling these invasives, and a lot of them you can control by hand. You can go out in the spring and you can pull garlic mustard out of a forest. You can, help cut down bush honeysuckle in the fall.

Chris: 33:36

Know, there's a lot of little simple steps you can do that, as long as there's a bunch of us out there doing them, can really have huge, you know, ecological impacts. You can adopt a trail, and I knew a guy down here that would do that. He would love mushroom hunting in the spring, and he kind of said, well, I'm gonna adopt this trail as I go look for my mushrooms. He brings a grocery bag or two and he pulls garlic mustard. Right?

Chris: 33:57

And so it's just a simple it doesn't really, require a lot of effort for him, but, you know, he's kept that that whole trail pretty much garlic mustard free for decades now. So I think, you know, that kind of stuff you can tell your neighbor. If they've got a bunch of bush honeysuckle, be really polite about it, of course, but tell them that they need to control it, those kind of things. A little bit of education goes a long way as long as you're friendly.

Abigail: 34:18

I was gonna say too, yeah, like, that makes a big difference, like, telling your community members and your your people you know about a lot of people don't know about Callery Pear, for example. A lot of people, it's like for a lot of towns, it's the standard Parkway tree that they plant. And so, you know, telling your friends, your neighbors, you never know who you talk to might be someone who's in a position to change a policy or make a difference. You know? And you never know if someone you talk to feels inspired to change their own yard.

Abigail: 34:46

Maybe they say how cool your, you know, spice bush is, and they're like, I gotta get that planned. So it always goes back to natives. Right, Erin? So Every podcast episode. Every time.

Chris: 34:59

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Somebody once told me one time, and I can't remember the exact wording of it, but, like, the best the best conservation ideas are spread over the fence. Right? And so if your neighbor sees you improving your land and they actually see, like, oh, wow.

Chris: 35:14

There they there are more deer on that land or there's neat wildflowers or whatever, they're gonna ask you about it. Right? And so I think, like, neighbor to neighbor, mouth to mouth spread or whatever with some of these great ideas is just it's fantastic. So the work you do on your land has some really neat benefits kind of broader than than actually on your acres. Right?

Abigail: 35:35

Absolutely. I mean, that's whole the whole basis for the work that I do, Chris. So I buy into that a 100 percent Well, Chris, thank you so much for taking the little bit of extra time for chatting with us about invasives and giving us a good understanding. I think I feel a little bit at least I like that we ended on an optimistic note because I feel a little bit more, like, ready to take on this invasive fight or at least understanding of it and talking to my neighbors and and things like that. So I really appreciate it, Chris.

Abigail: 36:05

It's been a really

Erin: 36:05

great time chatting with you.

Chris: 36:07

Yeah. Anytime. Happy to do it.

Abigail: 36:12

This podcast is University of Illinois Extension production, hosted and edited by Abigail Garofalo, Erin Garrett, and Amy Lefringhouse. Marketing and communications are by Emily Steele.