Dangerous Liaison

Some images draw a stronger reaction than others. For instance, this little botanical shot.  I was walking in Reynolda Gardens near our house in Winston-Salem when I noticed small turquoise and blue-green berries on a vine with pretty leaves. I made this picture and posted it on Facebook, because I have friends who are keen gardeners and I bet they could tell me the name of my mystery plant. Once I knew its name, maybe I could buy it somewhere-- or failing that, I confess that I thought a small cutting would never be missed.

"Eradicate this spawn of the devil before it spreads!" immediately posted my friend Jay Johnson.

"Porcelain berry-- a nasty invasive," volunteered Charlie Brummitt. He and his wife Lois have a painting of fall leaves and berries. "Better on the wall than in the ground," he added.

Myrna Harris wrote that there are porcelain berries at Reynolda because "folks were bent on having exotics from around the world."

Wow. I had almost fallen into the trap that has snared many horticulturists, amateur and professional, since people first started traveling and bringing home live souvenirs. A plant is considered "exotic" or "alien" if it has been introduced by humans to a place outside its natural range. According to the National Park Service, some 3500 species of exotic plants introduced to the U.S. have escaped cultivation and are now established in the wild. Not all of them are invasive; but if you take a plant away from natural controls such as critters that eat it and diseases that infect it back home, you run the risk that the plant will grow uncontrollably and start threatening native species and ecosystems.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I am reminded of The People vs. Pueraria lobata, a.k.a. kudzu, the scourge of the rural South. It was introduced from China at about the same time as its fellow-citizen, the porcelain berry vine. (Yep: there is more than one way to be overrun by Chinese imports.) Kudzu was purposefully distributed through the American South to control soil erosion. The porcelain berry, on the other hand, was purely ornamental and was spread by birds-- after being introduced by humans, I mean. Birds aren't horticulturists by intent. (If humans spread plants the same way birds do, would it be considered more natural, I wonder?)

In summary:

Porcelain berry, Ampelopsis brevipedunculata-
A deciduous perennial vine in the grape family. The fruits appear in the fall and change from lilac to green to bright blue and purple. Each of the berries contains two to four seeds. The berries attract birds and other small animals that eat them and disperse the seeds in their droppings.
NATIVE RANGE: China, Korea, Japan, and far eastern Russia. Porcelain berry was originally cultivated around the 1870s as a bedding plant. It is now found from New England to North Carolina and as far west as Michigan.
ECOLOGICAL THREAT: Porcelain berry is a vigorous invader of open and wooded places. It grows and spreads quickly in good light. As it spreads, it climbs over shrubs and other vegetation, shading out native plants and usurping nutrients. It has a big taproot, and if you cut the plant down to the ground it will just thumb its nose at you and re-sprout.

So enjoy the photo, buy the book, see the movie-- but hope that nobody poops porcelain berry seeds in your garden!