Ah, honeysuckle! We love it and we hate it. For some, honeysuckle conjures up memories of Grandma’s front porch on warm summer nights. For others, it’s the loss of a favorite tree choked out by the invasive honeysuckle. There seems to be no in-between when it comes to this classic plant.
When I was planning my front garden, honeysuckle was at the top of the list. But everyone started giving me conflicting information. Is honeysuckle invasive? Are bush types more invasive than vines? Can I grow honeysuckle without destroying my local ecosystem?
It’s actually not as confusing as it sounds, especially if you don’t have six different people telling your seven different things. Here are the facts:
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Invasive vs non-invasive honeysuckle
All honeysuckle plants are part of the Caprifoliaceae family of plants, most belonging to the Lonicera gender. But a few, including most bush honeysuckles, are members of the Diervilla gender.
Diervilla The genus honeysuckles are important because they are native to North America. These bush honeysuckles are an essential part of our ecosystem. They are non-invasive plants that provide food for our native insects. They are particularly essential to the larvae of the lesser engrailed moth (Ectropis crepuscularia) and the Common Emerald Butterfly (Geometry).
In the Lonicera genus, to which most honeysuckles belong, are a variety of beautiful, fragrant and non-invasive trumpet-like honeysuckles (L. sempervirens), common (L. periclymenum), and honey (L.caerulea).
But, some of Lonicera genus are real pests. L. japonica, L. maackii, L. morrowii, and L. tatarica are invasive honeysuckles. These species have become invasive because they do not belong to North America and have no natural constraints in the ecosystem to limit their spread.
In their native environment, these honeysuckles are not able to spread and smother all other plants. But here they can. And that’s exactly what they do.
How do invasive honeysuckle plants spread?
Honeysuckles are often fast growing plants. It’s one of the reasons we love trellising them. They can cover the trellis or create a quick and easy privacy screen in no time. Many varieties of honeysuckle also produce berries that attract birds. Birds eat the berries, scattering the seeds far and wide.
This combination of fast-growing, easy-to-spread seeds gives honeysuckle a natural edge. When you add a lack of natural checks and balances that prevent fast-spreading native plants from taking over, you have a recipe for invasive propagation.
Unfortunately, that’s not the only way invasive honeysuckle spreads. L. japonica, or Japanese honeysuckle, is readily available at many nurseries and plant supply stores. Often labeled “Hall’s Prolific” honeysuckle, this known invasive species is marketed to new gardeners as an “easy-to-grow” or “no-fail” honeysuckle vine.
Formerly, the honeysuckle of Amur (L. maackii) was planted to control erosion by maintenance crews and quickly took over. It is also found in nurseries. Greenhouses sell it under the cultivar names “Red Rem” and “Erubescens”.
When shopping for a honeysuckle plant to add to the garden, look at the binomial name. Do not buy honeysuckle without checking that it is not an invasive variety.
What’s the big deal?
Honeysuckle is beautiful and fragrant. So maybe you’re wondering if it really matters. After all, who doesn’t want an outpouring of sweet-smelling flowers?
It’s true that even invasive honeysuckles smell good. They have beautiful small flowers and lush foliage. Lounging in the evening under fragrant honeysuckle makes everyone feel a bit like a character in a Victorian novel.
But the invasive honeysuckles don’t just create romantic backdrops of lush gardens and fragrant summer nights. In fact, they take steps to ensure that there is no competition nearby.
That’s right, invasive honeysuckles grow so thick that they easily choke out any slower growing plants. Since invasive honeysuckles tend to come out earlier in the spring than native plants, it’s easy for them to claim an area before anyone else has a chance to grow. Some invasive varieties even send toxic chemicals into the soil, stunting or killing nearby plants.
Once the invasive honeysuckle claims an area, all plants in the understory are destroyed. For us, this means that tender and endangered plants like lady’s slipper and trillium are in danger. Plants such as milkweed, which are needed by specific pollinators, are also smothered.
Local plants and the animals that depend on them can’t compete with the sneaky tactics of the invasive honeysuckle.
Get rid of invasive honeysuckle
Maybe you have a yard full of invasive honeysuckle? Eliminating established honeysuckle plants is difficult. But if you want to plant a real garden, or slow the spread of this species, you can do it.
Don’t expect this to be a year-long process. The invasive honeysuckle will be back, year after year. It’s a bit like the flu. Every year you make elderberry syrup and watch for the signs, treat the flu if it comes, then repeat. But if you do well in the first year, it’s like starting flu season with a healthy immune system and plenty of vitamin C!
So let’s start strong.
1. Seasonal Removal
The best times to clean honeysuckle are in early spring and late fall. At these seasons it is easier to see the whole plant and pull it out. Honeysuckle has leaves in early spring and late fall, unlike most other plants. So do most of your removal at the start and end of the growing season.
Get out and cut the plant back to the roots whenever you see it appear, but focus mostly on those times. Use string trimmers, pruners, clippers or whatever you have. Just make sure the plant is pruned as much as possible.
2. Pull by the roots
If possible, remove the entire plant. Pull out the young honeysuckle plants by the root and discard. Honeysuckle can easily regrow if you leave the roots in the ground.
If your invasive honeysuckle plants are well established, it will be much more difficult to remove the root of the plant. Sometimes you can dig up the whole root, but more often than not you’ll have to kill the root before you pull it out.
3. Cut the stem
If the plant is too established to pull out easily, cut it to the ground, then kill the root. You can treat the root with an herbicide to kill it or cover the whole area with thick plastic and leave it for the summer.
I prefer the latter method. Covering large areas of garden with plastic will not only kill established roots, but will also prevent new honeysuckle plants from sprouting. While you’ll have an unsightly plastic-covered garden for a summer, the end result is a weed- and honeysuckle-free patch of land.
3. Herbicides
Many people recommend glyphosate to eliminate invasive honeysuckle. It’s a common treatment, but personally I’m not comfortable with something related to so many health issues.
If you have children, pets, a family history of cancer, liver problems, asthma, or infertility, keep glyphosate out of the garden. If you use glyphosate, avoid growing vegetables or fruit in the garden for a few years to let it leach out of the soil.
Although invasive honeysuckle is difficult to eradicate without resorting to glyphosate, you can. Your garden and family will thank you for doing it safely. The important thing is to remove the entire root system. Once you’ve cleared the area, whether you use herbicides or not, you’ll need to check every year for signs that new, invasive honeysuckles have taken hold.
Remember that honeysuckle is easily propagated by seed. If birds or deer have access to nearby honeysuckle vines, they can spread them to your garden. So come back every spring to see if there are any new honeysuckle plants in your garden.
Choose non-invasive honeysuckle
Now that you know how to avoid invasive honeysuckle and how to get rid of it, let’s talk about good honeysuckles. You can still plant a beautiful trellis of fragrant vines in your garden. All you have to do is pick the right strain.
There are so many native, non-invasive varieties of honeysuckle to choose from.
Within the trumpet honeysuckle variety, ‘Major Wheeler’ is one of the most popular cultivars. ‘Major Wheeler’ has beautiful bright red flowers and a heady fragrance. It is hardy in zones 4 to 8 and can climb up to 8 feet tall. It also tends to spread about 6 to 8 feet wide, making it perfect for walls and fences.
Among the common honeysuckles, ‘Peaches and Cream’ produces stunning pink and white flowers with an intoxicating scent. If you are growing primarily for fragrance, ‘Peaches and Cream’ is one of the best varieties. It’s a little more compact than ‘Major Wheeler’ – reaching only around 6ft tall and remaining slender, only around 2ft wide.
Honey berries are quite a different form of honeysuckle. While most honeysuckles produce berries that are toxic to humans, honey berries are edible and delicious.
These plants bush instead of vines and produce tasty blue berries. Honeyberry flowers don’t have a very strong scent, but they open early, giving bees an early food source. ‘Indigo Treat’ and ‘Aurora’ are two fantastic strains to grow if you want to grow this delicious variety of honeysuckle.
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