The blazing-red shrub that many Indiana homeowners love for fall color is quietly muscling native plants out of forests and fencerows, ecologists say. Winged burning bush, the ornamental with corky wings on its stems and shockingly bright autumn foliage, slips out of yards and forms thick carpets beneath hardwood trees. Experts are increasingly urging Hoosiers to stop buying and planting it while restoration crews scramble to pull it back from woods across the state.
According to IndyStar, Purdue researchers and botanists have documented burning bush in most of Indiana’s 92 counties. Stewardship teams at preserves such as Meltzer Woods are already locked in a long game, cutting, treating, and yanking up new seedlings. A coalition of botanists is now pushing to add burning bush, along with roughly a dozen other high-risk species, to the state’s banned list.
Why It Spreads So Easily
Burning bush produces bright, fleshy capsules that birds happily eat, then carry far beyond front yards into deep forest understories. Combine that with a knack for growing in shade and along roadsides, and it gains a major edge over native seedlings. The U.S. Forest Service’s Fire Effects Information System documents how birds spread the seeds and how quickly the shrub can become common in mixed-hardwood forests. State invasive-species resources warn that every landscape planting is essentially another seed source feeding those wild infestations. U.S. Forest Service provides identification tips and background on the species.
Rules, Lists And The Push To Ban More Plants
Indiana’s Terrestrial Plant Rule (312 IAC 18-3-25), adopted in 2019, makes it illegal to sell, gift, barter, or introduce 44 named invasive plants. Burning bush is not on that list, at least not yet. Conservation groups and botanists, led in part by the Indiana Native Plant Society, are urging the Department of Natural Resources to advance an amendment that would add around a dozen high-risk species, including burning bush, to the rule. The group outlines how the rule works now and how the proposed amendment would expand it. Indiana Native Plant Society details the policy and the effort to strengthen it.
Local Swaps And Replacements
Some communities are using carrots instead of sticks. County and regional programs are offering free native trees and shrubs to residents who dig out invasives. Hamilton County’s Invasive Species Trade-In program and a Northwestern Indiana replacement program in the Little Calumet-Galien watershed have both swapped free native plants in exchange for proof that invasives were removed. Many of these local events put special emphasis on problem favorites such as Callery pear and burning bush, along with other commonly planted invaders. The Reporter and local program pages explain how the swaps work.
How To Remove It Without Making Things Worse
Getting rid of burning bush takes patience. Land managers recommend pulling small seedlings when the soil is moist, cutting larger stems and immediately treating the fresh stumps so they do not resprout, or using carefully targeted foliar or basal herbicide applications directed by a professional. Forest Service management literature and a technical guide from the Southern Research Station list cut-and-treat and directed-spray methods as effective options for woody invasives. Once the shrubs are out, the advice is to replant with native species that offer fall color without the invasive fallout. USDA Southern Research Station and Purdue University provide detailed control guidance and replacement suggestions for homeowners and land managers.
In short, that picture-perfect red shrub might look great in October, but ecologists argue it belongs in old yard photos, not new planting plans. State agencies and local partners now offer identification guides, trade-in programs, and step-by-step help so residents can spot invasives, remove them safely, and choose native alternatives instead. Indiana DNR maintains resources and reporting tools for Hoosiers who want to tackle problem plants on their own property.
