Honeysuckle replacement on a stream bank

The sad truth is that most stream banks in this city are dominated by bush honeysuckle. Honeysuckle is an opportunistic invader. Stream banks suffer disturbance more often with flash flooding events exacerbated by urban sprawl. After the water recedes, the honeysuckle arrives first on the scene to claim the disturbed area.

The first step in removing honeysuckle is often making a path through it. Cut back branches to remove eye gougers and tripping hazards. The trees that are too big to pull out by hand, about an inch or more, can be trimmed back to a central leader. Don’t cut the big ones all the way to the ground yet, leave a sturdy trunk to help with pulling them out later. All smaller trees can be pulled out by hand. Cut enough honeysuckle to open the light to the soil.

Killing all the honeysuckle first can increase erosion issues as the honeysuckle is the only thing keeping the bank in place. So next, we seed native bank stabilizing plants. If the area is shady, I recommend beak grass, river oats, and sensitive fern. These are plants that will spread rapidly to form a colony. If the area is sunny try mountain mint, fox sedge, and aromatic aster. Keep removing any baby honeysuckle that pops up for the next year or two. When the ground cover plants have established across the area, it is time to kill the big honeysuckle.

The big honeysuckles can be root docked or cut and poisoned. Root docking can disturb the soil so try to keep the disturbance to a minimum and keep a continues eye out for erosion problems. The poison used for honeysuckle can have negative impacts on the stream ecosystem. Minimize any chemicals contaminating the banks by only painting the living portions of the cut with chemical and working when rain is not a threat.

Once the big honeysuckle is out, it can be replaced with a native shrub. Great native plants for stream banks are gray dogwood, hazelnut, elderberry, willow, and sumac. Plant the new shrubs as soon as possible after removing the big honeysuckle. The roots from the shrubs will help control erosion by working with the groundcover to make a dense network of roots.

Continue monitoring the stream bank several times a year. Baby honeysuckle will need to be pulled. Sometimes, all the disturbance from the replanting may bring in new invasives like Japanese hops or stilt grass. Stop invasives before they crowed out the natives. Soil erosion may happen and needs to be corrected right away. Checking the stream bank after every big rain is a good way to keep on top of soil washing away.