Just like beauty, weeds are in the eyes of the beholder.
Literally, a weed is any plant growing where it is unwanted. This means that the most precious rose, the daintiest daffodil or the plumpest peony, if they happen to spring up in the wrong place, are regarded as no more than lowly weeds.
More commonly, a difference of opinion arises around wildflowers. To some, they comprise Mother Nature’s own garden. To others, they are nothing more than a nuisance.
Just ask the Indiana Department of Transportation, which several years ago began to plant wildflowers and other native plant species along highways.
Officials heard complaints from some motorists that “weeds” were taking over medians and ditches. Other motorists, surely, appreciated the more natural greenery growing along major thoroughfares.
INDOT also adopted the mantra “more management, less mowing” and reduced its frequency of mowing from five times a year to three, for two stated reasons: It’s good for the native plants, and it saves money. The state still spends about $8 million a year mowing about 40,000 acres.
Complaints are still lodged, but INDOT officials say they get fewer each year as more people get used to the wildflowers and higher grasses.
The department’s planting and mowing strategy makes ecological and financial sense. While some still miss the manicured ditches of the past, many see the beauty in wild growth.
Plus, the flowers provide habitat that combats the decline of species such as butterflies.
Safety, of course, should always be the first concern on our highways, meaning that INDOT is compelled to mow wherever growth impedes vision or infringes on pavement.
This is true on city streets and county roads, too. Local government should be encouraged to cultivate native plant growth but should also have an active strategy to keep the greenery from getting so high that it makes intersections, curves and even straightaways dangerous.
We can all agree on this: Any plant, even the most gorgeous rose bush, that obstructs the vision of motorists is a weed that needs cutting.