Stewardship Field Checklist

A proposal to create a simple and standard checklist for homeowners and garden maintenance crews

Why This Checklist

Detailed identification guides and best management practices for invasive plants in New York State exist and are excellent. What does not exist is a compact field decision sheet for the people who actually encounter these plants every day without supervision: town maintenance crews, landscaping contractors, and residents. These are the people doing the most unsupervised plant removal in the state, and they have no official guidance at all. Organized volunteer workdays reach dozens of people a few times a year. A crew with a mower and a string trimmer reaches every road edge and park boundary every two weeks.

Detailed guides for further reference

Hudsonia / Lower Hudson PRISM, Best Management Practices for Priority Invasive Plants in the Lower Hudson Valley (2025 update): hudsonia.org
NYS DEC, Prohibited and Regulated Invasive Plants booklet with photos: dec.ny.gov
Cornell Cooperative Extension, species-by-species identification and control: ccedutchess.org
Lower Hudson PRISM, invasive species ID video series and resources: lhprism.org

Design intent. The final version is meant to fit on two sides of a single printed page, with color identification photos. It should be customizable by region (keyed to the local PRISM and its priority species) and by season (spring ephemeral invasives vs. summer growers vs. fall seed-set timing). It should be produced in English and Spanish on the same sheet, or in separate language editions where space requires it. The content framework below is a draft. Design, photography, and regional adaptation remain to be done.

The single rule that matters most When in doubt, don't pull it out. A native plant you destroy is harder to replace than an invasive you leave for next week. Learn the natives to spare before you learn the weeds to remove.

Safety, every time

Wear gloves, long sleeves, and closed shoes
Pull when soil is moist
Bag and remove seed heads and root fragments
Don't compost invasives on site

Section 1

Vines: Cut Back and Uproot Most, Know the Few to Keep

Aggressive smothering vines pull down trees and blanket the ground. Cut at the base and again at shoulder height, then uproot what you can.

Remove these invasive vines

Oriental bittersweet
Porcelainberry
Japanese honeysuckle
English ivy
Wintercreeper (creeping euonymus)

⚠️ Poison ivy: recognize and protect Poison ivy is native but a skin hazard. "Leaves of three, let it be." Cover up fully, wash skin and tools after, and never burn it. In a wild area you may leave it for wildlife. In a high-traffic spot, remove with care and full protection.

✅ Spare these native vines Virginia creeper (five leaflets, not poison ivy's three), native wild grape, trumpet creeper, virgin's bower clematis, groundnut. These belong here.

Section 2

Trees in the Wrong Place

A seedling is "wrong" because of what it is or where it is.

Remove: invasive trees

Norway maple — milky sap from a snapped leaf stalk, where sugar maple's runs clear
Tree-of-heaven (ailanthus) — rank peanut-like smell, host of spotted lanternfly
Callery / "Bradford" pear

Relocate or remove only if misplaced: native trees Ash, oak, black cherry, and box elder seedlings sprouting against foundations, in beds, or under power lines. Healthy native trees are targets only when truly in the wrong spot. Many ash are already failing from emerald ash borer.

Section 3

Forbs and Perennials: Vigorous Summer Growers

Most volunteers that erupt and dominate over the summer are nonnative.

Remove these invasive forbs

Garlic mustard
Dame's rocket
Lesser celandine

✅ Spare, protect, or transplant these native volunteers Milkweed, asters, goldenrod, black-eyed Susan. These feed pollinators. Flag them, don't yank them.

Section 4

Annuals: Pull Before They Set Seed

Annuals die each year, so win by stopping the seed.

Priority annual

Japanese stiltgrass — shallow-rooted, with a silvery midrib stripe, sprawling in shade. Pull or mow before September seed-set. A clean pull this year means far less next year.

Section 5

Report, Don't Fight, the Entrenched Infestations

Some species spread worse when chopped. Don't dig these. Map and report them, especially fresh, small, or new patches, which are the cheapest to stop.

Do not attempt removal Japanese knotweed (bamboo-like canes, hollow, red-flecked) and mugwort (sage-scented, silver leaf undersides) spread from rhizome and stem fragments. Chopping them up can make things worse.

Where to report

Report to iMapInvasives (nyimapinvasives.org, web or mobile app), New York's official invasive-species database run by the NY Natural Heritage Program. Your local PRISM (Westchester falls under Lower Hudson PRISM) prioritizes response. New and early detections are the highest-value reports.