The idea of a giant man-eating flytrap like "Audrey" in the Little Shop of Horrors is a hilarious joke, but the truth is, some plants are scarier than they look.  Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata) isn’t poisonous to humans, and it doesn’t have thorns, but it has the power to seriously disrupt ecosystems and even to destroy other species of plants and animals.

Garlic mustard is an invasive alien plant. Invasive plants are those especially well-equipped to compete with and crowd out native plants. Like many other invasives, garlic mustard produces huge amounts of seed.  It leafs out earlier in the spring, shading out the fragile native wildflowers.  It also produces a chemical that retards the growth of other plants.

The destructive qualities of garlic mustard aren’t limited to the plant kingdom.  Garlic mustard is similar enough to some native wildflowers, the toothworts, that a rare butterfly is fooled into laying its eggs on the garlic mustard.

The West Virginia White butterfly is the unfortunate victim of garlic mustard.  When the caterpillars emerge, they feed on the garlic mustard leaves, which prevents them from thriving. Between crowding out the toothwort and poisoning the caterpillars, garlic mustard has significantly reduced the numbers of West Virginia White butterflies.

At the Garden, we no longer acquire known invasive plants for permanent planting.  We are gradually removing invasive plants and replacing them with less aggressive species. 

Posted by Ann McCulloh