Continuing my series on progress toward transitioning my yard to a suburban savanna…..

This is only my first summer implementing the strategy, but I am already experiencing some areas that are overgrown…with natives. In a larger space, the tangle would simply be allowed to continue but in my third acre suburban savanna, actions are needed on my part very similar to my actions when it comes to invasives!

Virginia creeper is great near my front door, and I can easily keep it controlled there because I see it all the time. In other places (in a corner of a flower bed behind some crape myrtle and boxwood, for example), it tends to be problematic, and it requires me to get back there to hack it out. I have been cutting only what is on the brick but now I will cut more and hopefully eventually reduce it to a once-a-year job.

My strategy with poison ivy was to leave it unless it was in a place I would likely be without gloves. Now I am rethinking that even though the patch is interesting because it has the poison ivy leaf gall too. I’m going to gear up and clean out that bed…maybe plant some cone flowers there!

Last year I had a clump of White Heath Aster near my driveway, and it is there again this year….and there is clump in my backyard too. I am leaving both since they are great for pollinating insects in the fall – but I don’t want more of them in my yard. If they come up in more places next year, I will mow them!

I am learning to cope with pokeweed. If it comes up in an empty space, I leave it…but I trim it to keep it low and leafy. It has filled in an area under a window where a non-native cedar died, a slope on the side of the house (reducing the area I mow and holding the soil with its deeper roots, and filling in a corner (it is hiding a place I dump grass clippings too!).

Grapevines seem to be everywhere this year. I don’t mind them in some places…but I will keep them out of my trees. It is going to take some vigilance.

The same is true with the black raspberry canes. They have lovely pale green stems and white underside of the leaves. There are thorns too. I want to leave some of the plants since wildlife like the fruit…but I will be cutting them in places I want to be able to easily access!

I like violets for the ground cover in all my shady areas but they hide young redbuds and maples and oaks that will eventually need to be cut. Hackberries are everywhere – growing with the hollies and in other bushes. I am considering leaving them but also realizing that I will eventually need to cut them down since they are not in places where I want a larger tree!