Invasive Species Removal

Front Range Environmental has helped us begin our restoration of a wetland in Schaumburg. The Army Corps requires us to manage any invasive plant species found within the buffer and wetland limits at this site. Front Range Environmental went to the site with a small skid steer to cut down buckthorn and willow found throughout the wetland. Willow species (although some of them are native) have rhizomes that grow just beneath the ground surface. These rhizomes spread in many directions which gives the willow plant many opportunities to grow (and eventually overrun) in disturbed wetlands. Buckthorn plants do not have rhizomes but they do reproduce rapidly and have allelopathic roots. This means that their roots have poisons in them that are used on neighboring plant roots to kill competitors off. The European buckthorn did not evolve in this area (hence the name) so the native plants of Illinois of not evolved effective ways to counteract the poison of the buckthorn. Thank you to Front Range Environmental in getting a head start on controlling the invasives.