[PCA] Border War - NY Times Op-ed

[BIKEITMIKE1 at aol.com]

If you haven't already seen this sickening NY Times op-ed, it would be well 
worth the effort to send a responding letter to the editor.  letters at nytimes.com

Mike Lawler


March 19, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
Border War 
By GEORGE BALL
Warminster, Pa.
THE horticultural world is having its own debate over immigration, with some 
environmentalists warning about the dangers of so-called exotic plants from 
other countries and continents "invading" American gardens. These botanical 
xenophobes say that a pristine natural state exists in our yards and that to 
disturb it is both sinful and calamitous. In their view, exotic plants will swallow 
your garden, your neighbors' gardens and your neighbors' neighbors' gardens 
until the ecosystem collapses under their rampant suffocating growth.
If anything suffocates us, though, it will be the environmentalists' 
narrowmindedness. Like all utopian visions, their dream beckons us into a perfect and 
rational natural world where nothing ever changes — a world that never existed 
and never will. 
Native plants are the survivalists of the botanical world, and in the 
appropriate settings — wilderness areas, home and botanical gardens, public parks and 
sidewalks — they bless us with their beauty and awe us with their tenacity. 
Our lives would be poor and grim without the strawberry, cranberry, columbine 
and trillium. They've always been here, in the same way that Native Americans 
have been; only their arrival and settlement are more ancient. 
Their presence illustrates a geologic time, about 8,000 years ago, when the 
glaciers receded and unimaginably vast deluges swallowed the surface of the 
future United States — an airplane ride over the Midwest reveals enormous lakes 
formed by even larger melted ice masses. As the landscape changed, the 
botanical world sorted itself out, leaving us with the hardy "natives." (It should be 
noted, though, that many plants now considered natives — like sycamores, 
magnolias and cinnamon — arrived from other continents, just as we did. They are 
products of adaptation.)
Like human survivalists, natives are also subject to exploitation by the 
horticultural equivalent of radical fundamentalists. The anti-exotics argue that 
gardens should be populated exclusively by native plants, as if the exotics 
were trying to enter the flower bed illegally. The consequences of such a stand 
could be dire. Should we eat no onions or garlic, apples or lemons; feast our 
eyes on no magnificent tulips or roses — all exotics of Eurasian origin? Should 
Asians not enjoy their distinctive peppers, tomatoes, beans, squash, 
sunflowers and corn — all from the Americas? 
Indeed, the world's most popular root crop, potatoes, started life as a 
staple of the Andean people and achieved its first international fame as a slave 
food. By the time it reached France, the "earth apple" was a delicacy likened to 
truffles; their flowers were featured in tiaras of court ladies. Exotic 
indeed.
Should we deprive ourselves of petunias, begonias, impatiens and hollyhocks — 
not a one of them "native"? Must we, on pain of being cast out of the garden 
as horticultural pariahs, deny the elephant his peanuts? This wouldn't be 
merely ridiculous. It would compare with the denial of human immigration on 
grounds that certain ethnic groups breed in numbers "too prolific" for the existing 
elite to tolerate. Imagine, then, a horticultural ruling class. No "invasives" 
need apply: let the lily find another valley. Such prohibitions of exotic 
plant species demonstrate only an elitist snobbery that is as dangerous to a free 
society as it is to a free botany.
No one, and certainly no gardener, grows truly destructive invasive plants in 
his garden. The devastating kudzu in the South, star thistle in the West and 
purple loosestrife in the East were accidental introductions from Asia, most 
often mixed with the feed and bedding of livestock. Yet the pro-native, 
anti-exotic partisans also wish us to stop enjoying the charms of harmless and 
beautiful plants like Queen Anne's lace, yarrow and chicory. Aside from requiring a 
bit of weeding, exotics are safe as milk, unless one considers gardening a 
chore rather than a passionate hobby. If so, forget the forget-me-nots.
Let's welcome, as spring arrives tomorrow, as many huddled masses of flowers, 
herbs and vegetables as can fit in our unique melting pot of a nation, 
unrivaled in its tradition of lush diversity and freedom to grow rampantly.
George Ball, a former president of the American Horticultural Society, is the 
president of the seed and plant company W. Atlee Burpee & Company.


Copyright 2006The New York Times Company
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