In a recent meeting of the Upper Cumberland Forestry Association, Dr. Wayne Clatterbuck mentioned that the last 10 years the population of exotics plants and insects have exploded in Tennessee.  During a recent trip to West Virginia I saw the sides of the interstates and roadways in Kentucky completely inundated  bush honeysuckle  and in West Virginia mostly autumn or Russian olive.  In the Upper Cumberlands the exotic plants that I come across on just about every farm are Japanese stiltgrass, tree of heaven,  Chinese privet – privet, and multiflora rose.  These exotics occupy space where native plants once occupied.  These exotics are impossible to eliminate,  they will continue to seed back on to your property from adjacent sites.  It is and will always be a constant battle to eliminate invasive exotics .  It is interesting to note that in Tennessee most of the exotic plant species do not fall under quarantine requirements as do exotic insects such as the emerald ash bore.  Your neighbors can buy and plant these exotics while you spend your money and the government money trying to eliminate them from your property.

In Tennessee the Forest Service and the TN Division of Forestry are spending millions of dollars each year in attempts to control the gypsy moth, emerald ash bore,  and the thousand canker disease. We have been successful in controlling the spread of the gypsy moth but not so much with emerald ash bore (EAB) and thousand canker disease.  It appears that the EAB will go through the ash trees like the chestnut blight did to the American chestnut.  The jury is still out on what the thousand canker disease is going to do to the black walnut.