Pollinator-Friendly Flowering Native Plant Seed Giveaway

Common Invasive Plants in Your Southern Vancouver Island Garden

An invasive plant is a species introduced to an area where it didn’t evolve. Usually brought in intentionally as an ornamental, a hedge, or erosion control, or accidentally through contaminated soil, ballast water, or garden waste. Without the insects, diseases, and competing plants that kept it in check back home, an invasive species can spread unchecked in its new environment.

Invasive plants outcompete native species for light, water, and space, often growing faster and setting seed more prolifically than anything that evolved alongside them. Native pollinators, birds, and insects that rely on specific native plants lose habitat and food sources when those plants disappear. 

Pulling invasive plants is one of the most direct, low-barrier ways to protect the ecosystems around us. We do this to give native plants, and everything that depends on them, room to come back. Every ivy vine cut, every broom pod removed before it splits, is one less seed source for next year.