Be Careful With Those Plants; Dispose but Don’t Release!

Original story: Melinda Myers

As we start see leaves drop, lots of folks are starting to prepare their homes and gardens for winter. If you’ve got a water garden, you’ll be starting to do the same thing! Water gardens make a great addition to any landscape masking unwanted noise, inviting songbirds to take a drink, and providing a beautiful oasis in any landscape. Fall is the time to prepare your water garden for winter. Tropical plants need to be moved indoors and aggressive or invasive plants should be removed and disposed of properly. Contact your local municipality for tips on disposing these and your local Department of Natural Resources for a list of invasive plants in your area that need to be removed. Eliminating invasive plants from our landscapes helps keep them out of our lakes and waterways!

With a history of popular water garden plants being released in our region, following these steps is an easy way to be a steward for your local waterways and your water garden!

Photo Credit: Chris Acy (Fox-Wolf), Melinda Myers

Questions? Comments? Contact Chris Acy, the AIS Coordinator covering Brown, Outagamie, Fond du Lac, Calumet, and Winnebago Counties at (920) 460-3674 or chris@fwwa.org!

Follow the Fox Wolf Watershed Alliance’s Winnebago Waterways Program on our Winnebago Waterways Facebook page or @WinnWaterways on X! You can also sign-up for email updates at WinnebagoWaterways.org.

Check out the Keepers of the Fox Program at https://fwwa.org/watershed-recovery/lower-fox-recovery/

Winnebago Waterways and Keepers of the Fox are Fox-Wolf Watershed Alliance programs. The Fox-Wolf Watershed Alliance is an independent nonprofit organization working to protect and restore water resources in the Fox-Wolf River Basin.

Reporting invasive species is a first step in containing their spread. Maintaining and restoring our waters and landscapes can reduce the impacts even when we don’t have other management options to an invasive species.