密歇根新闻广播 日本伏牛花的影响

 

Forests in our region are under attack from a shrub¹.The culprit is an ornamental² plant called Japanese barberry. It was introduced from Asia in the late 1800s. It's been in used in landscaping in Michigan for decades, but it's considered invasive.

I just found out I have some in my front yard.

They're pretty, with bright red berries that birds love to eat.

And that's where the problem comes in.

Joanne Foreman is with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.

"What we are more concerned about is the fact that it is spreading in ways that no one anticipated," says Foreman.

"The berries are favored by several birds and those birds drop those seeds, for instance, in open forest areas, and that barberry will take over really quickly. It tends to sprout³ early and take over a lot of ground, and that leaves no room for some of our native plants," she says.

But wait - it gets worse. The branches have small thorns all over them. It makes a nice, safe little house for deer mice.

"Deer mice tend to host larval ticks, including those ticks that can be infected with Lyme disease," says Foreman. "And when they find protection under Japanese barberry, their populations tend to increase."

She says Japanese barberry is becoming a key invasive species in our state parks.

It's not illegal to buy it in Michigan, but Foreman says it's a buyer beware situation.

"We don't say, 'no, you can't buy it,' but we do want people to be informed of the invasive habit of the plant," she says.

She says if you want to get rid of the barberry in your yard, you can pull it out, put it in a dark plastic bag, seal it up, and put it in the trash.

But when Japanese barberry escapes into the wild, it can be a lot harder to get rid of. In Pennsylvania, there's a woodlot where researchers are battling barberry.

Ryan Utz is a professor at Chatham University's Falk School of Sustainability.

"This is what we call barberry hell. That's going to be all that you see," says Utz, walking through damp, forested land on campus.

Ryan Utz at one of the survey sites on the property of Chatham University's Eden Hall campus.

Utz has some other choice words for the thorny⁴, shoulder-high shrubs⁵ we see all along the tree line: he calls them insidious⁶ and alarming. That's because of what's beyond the wall of barberry.

"We have a nice population of mature oaks, cherries and red maples⁷ here. But based on our research, everywhere you see barberry, which as you can see right now is pretty much everywhere, there are no young trees underneath⁸ it," he says.

Utz is dealing⁹ with a stubborn patch of barberry with some barberry busting¹⁰ tools.

He slices through the barberry stems with hedge trimmers, getting as close to the ground as possible.

"See that yellow stem material, that's classic barberry, bright, bright, bright yellow," says Utz.

Then grad student Art Link hooks up a propane tank to a small torch.

"What I like to do is actually go around and get a 360 burn," says Link.

He slowly incinerates the cluster of barberry stems. The plant smolders¹¹. But Link says he'll have to do it again. Barberry has been known to grow back even after it's been torched.

Kelly Sitch is an ecologist with the Pennsylvania Bureau of Forestry¹².

Art Link torches barberry to try to kill it. This has to be done more than once because the barberry often grows back.

He says the plant's berries aren't really nutritious¹³ for wildlife, the way that junk food isn't ideal for people. And there's that thorny issue: barberry makes a home for mice, and the ticks they host.

"In areas where barberry remains¹⁴ uncontrolled, research has found that the incidence of ticks per acre that are infected with Lyme disease is actually much higher than in areas where it's being controlled or where it's not present in forests," says Sitch.

Kelly Sitch and Ryan Utz agree when it comes to the best way to keep Japanese barberry out of our region's forests.

"Please, don't buy barberry," says Utz.

It's been banned in some states, but many nurseries and big box stores still sell Japanese barberry for landscaping. Utz says there are other, non-invasive

1 shrub   

n.灌木，灌木丛

参考例句：

• There is a small evergreen shrub on the hillside.山腰上有一小块常绿灌木丛。
• Moving a shrub is best done in early spring.移植灌木最好是在初春的时候。

2 ornamental   

adj.装饰的；作装饰用的；n.装饰品；观赏植物

参考例句：

• The stream was dammed up to form ornamental lakes.溪流用水坝拦挡起来,形成了装饰性的湖泊。
• The ornamental ironwork lends a touch of elegance to the house.铁艺饰件为房子略添雅致。

3 sprout   

n.芽，萌芽；vt.使发芽，摘去芽；vi.长芽，抽条

参考例句：

• When do deer first sprout horns?鹿在多大的时候开始长出角？
• It takes about a week for the seeds to sprout.这些种子大约要一周后才会发芽。

4 thorny   

adj.多刺的，棘手的

参考例句：

• The young captain is pondering over a thorny problem.年轻的上尉正在思考一个棘手的问题。
• The boys argued over the thorny points in the lesson.孩子们辩论功课中的难点。

5 shrubs   

灌木( shrub的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The gardener spent a complete morning in trimming those two shrubs. 园丁花了整个上午的时间修剪那两处灌木林。
• These shrubs will need more light to produce flowering shoots. 这些灌木需要更多的光照才能抽出开花的新枝。

6 insidious   

adj.阴险的，隐匿的，暗中为害的，（疾病）不知不觉之间加剧

参考例句：

• That insidious man bad-mouthed me to almost everyone else.那个阴险的家伙几乎见人便说我的坏话。
• Organized crime has an insidious influence on all who come into contact with it.所有和集团犯罪有关的人都会不知不觉地受坏影响。

7 maples   

槭树，枫树( maple的名词复数 )； 槭木

参考例句：

• There are many maples in the park. 公园里有好多枫树。
• The wind of the autumn colour the maples carmine . 秋风给枫林涂抹胭红。

8 underneath   

adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面

参考例句：

• Working underneath the car is always a messy job.在汽车底下工作是件脏活。
• She wore a coat with a dress underneath.她穿着一件大衣，里面套着一条连衣裙。

9 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

10 busting   

打破，打碎( bust的现在分词 )； 突击搜查（或搜捕）； （使）降级，降低军阶

参考例句：

• Jim and his wife were busting up again yesterday. 吉姆和他的妻子昨天又吵架了。
• He figured she was busting his chops, but it was all true. 他以为她在捉弄他，其实完全是真的。

11 smolders   

n.焖烧，文火，冒烟( smolder的名词复数 )v.用文火焖烧，熏烧，慢燃( smolder的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• Watch as fire smolders at the bullet-ridden Red Mosque complex. 现在，大火正在红色清真寺内燃烧。 来自互联网

12 forestry   

n.森林学；林业

参考例句：

• At present, the Chinese forestry is being at a significant transforming period. 当前, 我国的林业正处于一个重大的转折时期。
• Anhua is one of the key forestry counties in Hunan province. 安化县是湖南省重点林区县之一。

13 nutritious   

adj.有营养的，营养价值高的

参考例句：

• Fresh vegetables are very nutritious.新鲜蔬菜富于营养。
• Hummingbirds have discovered that nectar and pollen are very nutritious.蜂鸟发现花蜜和花粉是很有营养的。

14 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。