December 19, 2025 • 47 mins
How do humans support some plants and endanger others? What do herbaria teach about climate change? How can people and plants collaborate towards livable futures? Featuring Mason Heberling, Curator of Botany at Carnegie Museum of Natural History, and Bonnie Isaac, Collection Manager of Botany at Carnegie Museum of Natural History.
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Episode Transcript
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Michael Pisano (00:09):
You're listening to the Anthropocene Archives, a
presentation of We Are Nature.
In this special series ofstories, we're delving deep into
Carnegie Museum of NaturalHistory's 22 million collection
items, raiding cabinets andcases, sifting through objects
and organisms in search ofstories of stewardship,
solutions, and scientificwonder.
On today's episode, anendangered narrowly local, a
(00:35):
thriving garden fugitive, andgratitude for our green world.
We're hanging in the herbariumwith two unbeliefable botanists.
So turn it to the volume.
This'll be an episode toremember.
Welcome to We Are Nature, ashow about natural history and
(00:55):
livable futures presented byCarnegie Museum of Natural
History.
I'm your host, photosynthesisMVR Michael Pizzano, and today
I'm joined by two botanyexperts.
Friends will you pleaseintroduce yourselves?
Bonnie Isaac (01:05):
Hi, my name is Bonnie Isaac.
I am the collection managerhere at the Carnegie Museum of
Natural History.
I've been here since 1989, andmy area of interest is
endangered and rare plants ofPennsylvania.
Mason Heberling (01:20):
Wonderful.
And?
My name is Mason Heberling.
I'm the Associate Curator ofBotany here at Carnegie Museum
of Natural History.
My research is pretty broad.
I'm interested in kind ofglobal change, environmental
change, impacts on plants, inparticular invasive plants, and
also impacts of climate change.
Michael Pisano (01:36):
Perfect.
Thank you both so much forjoining us and for bringing us
behind the scenes of the botanycollection here.
And I was wondering if just tokick us off, you could tell us a
little bit about the museum'splant collections.
Bonnie Isaac (01:47):
Yeah, we have around 550,000 specimens from
all over the world.
They are all pressed and driedand glued down to archival
quality paper with a label on itthat says what it is, where it
was collected, and who collectedit.
Michael Pisano (02:00):
That's incredible.
And can you tell me about thekind of time scale that this was
collected over?
Bonnie Isaac (02:05):
Our earliest collections are from the late
1700s.
Our most recent collections arefrom like yesterday.
Michael Pisano (02:14):
And it seems like there's um a pretty
consistent methodology here.
Can you describe kind of whatwe're looking at here in terms
of this preparation in anherbarium?
Bonnie Isaac (02:24):
What we do is we will collect the specimen that
we're interested in and we willput it in a plant press, which
consists of newspaper andcardboards, and we will press
them and then put them in frontof a heater fan to dry them.
If we dry them quick, they'llkeep their color better and
they'll retain their DNA.
And so once we have thempressed and dried, then we will
glue them or linen strap tapethem onto archival quality paper
(02:49):
so that we can store them inall these beautiful cabinets.
Michael Pisano (02:52):
Do you have a sense of how many of these types
of specimens you've prepared?
Bonnie Isaac (02:56):
I do not.
I personally have collectedabout 30,000 specimens.
Michael Pisano (03:02):
Wow, that's incredible.
And so you said 550,000 here inthe museum.
That is a pretty incredibleamount of plants, obviously, but
I'm sure it kind of pales incomparison to the species of
plants, the biodiversity outthere in the world.
Can one of you tell me kind ofabout what we think the plant
biodiversity out there isglobally?
Mason Heberling (03:22):
So it depends who you ask, but probably the
number of taxa or number ofdifferent species of plants in
the world is somewhere on theorder of 350,000, give or take.
Depends again who you ask andhow you splice up what's a
species and what's not aspecies, and that's constantly
changing.
New species are always beingdescribed.
What we know is now what youknow what was two species may
(03:45):
become one, and vice versa.
So it's an ever-changing thing,and that's why the herbarium's
important for that.
Michael Pisano (03:50):
Yeah, speak a little bit more about that.
Like I know that it's almost animpossibly infinite answer,
maybe, but maybe there'ssomething you can do with it.
Like, I'm curious about thetypes of research that can be
done from this sort of specimen.
Mason Heberling (04:03):
So there are many uses of herbarium
specimens, some of which we areonly recently kind of realizing
or appreciating.
So when the kind of institutionof herberia, which is the
plural of herbarium, kind ofbegan, you know, probably, you
know, in the 1600s, give ortake, really was about plant
exploration, right?
And also the novelty of plantsgrowing far away.
(04:25):
This is from a Europeanperspective.
Right.
A couple decades in, it reallydid become a very strongly
scientific enterprise, and thatis naming, describing,
cataloging plant diversityacross the world.
And so that kind of core use ofspecimens remains.
So kind of taxonomy, namingplants, where plants grow, where
(04:46):
plants can be found, whereplants were found, which I'm
guessing we might talk abouthere later.
And so that's kind of the coreis taxonomy and systematics.
And that's kind of what youthink of usually when you think
of a specimen or a naturalhistory museum in general.
But there's a lot more thanthat that's that has been
happening.
So though that's remained thecore, a lot of other uses, so in
particular, kind of ecology, sousing these specimens in some
(05:10):
ways, um, it kind of actsthey're kind of accidental in a
way.
So we can look at likeflowering times as one instance,
you know, as Bonnie said, eachplant has the label of where it
was collected, when it wascollected, with physical
material.
So there's kind of a lot thatyou can do with that looking at
in particular looking at change,but not only looking at change.
So in the case of phonology, Imean, by phonology, we mean kind
(05:33):
of the recurring biologicalcycles in nature.
So, you know, bird migration,for instance, or in the case of
plants, plant flowering times,or leafout times, or leaf drop
times.
So from these specimens, wehave a record of if the plant
was flowering at a given timeand in a given location.
And so, with you know, a coupledozen, hundred, thousand
(05:55):
specimens over the last coupledecades, hundreds of years, we
can look at long-term changes inflowering time.
So, one kind of gut hypothesisis that as springs get warmer,
plants respond by leafing outand flowering earlier and
earlier.
So we can use your variantrecord to look at that kind of
at a species level or even at aregional level.
And then the neat thing aboutthat too is it also kind of
(06:18):
might seem simple, but it'sactually quite complicated.
Different plants respond todifferent phenological cues.
Not all plants respond thesame.
How does their pollinatorsrespond, for instance, or how do
their competitors respond?
So it's kind of this um it'sit's much more complicated than
just earlier springs equalsearlier flowering times.
But that is just one example ofmany, which I could continue um
(06:40):
blathering on with otherexamples.
That's great.
Michael Pisano (06:43):
We'll blather more, I think, throughout the
hour.
Um I'd love to move into thekind of collection items that
we've brought.
And Bonnie, maybe we couldstart with what you've got here.
Mackenzie Kimmel (07:04):
Prior to being flattened and affixed to a
piece of paper, collection itemone grew almost a foot tall from
sandy soil.
Its signature narrow leaves areopposite, meaning they grow in
pairs originating at the samelevel on the stem on opposite
(07:24):
sides.
If you encountered this itembetween September and October,
you might be mesmerized by aunique blue flower.
The blooms and stamens curl upand over the petals in an
elegant swoop.
The anthers are suspended inspace like a pollen-laden lure.
(07:47):
What is collection item one?
Bonnie Isaac (07:57):
This is trichostoma cetaceum, the
narrow-leaved blue curl.
This plant has a blue flowerthat has a nice little curl on
the end, and hence its commonname, blue curls.
It grows on shale barrens, sovery open, hot, dry areas.
We have three species oftrichostoma here in
Pennsylvania.
Two of them are fairly common,and this one is endangered on
(08:20):
the on the state's endangeredlist.
So I was doing some uh surveywork for Kate's Mountain Clover,
which I had a grant to do a fewyears ago, and so we were at a
site where we had there was ahistoric record for Kate's
mountain clover.
And while when I'm out doingrare plant surveys, I like to
look at what are the associatedspecies and what else is there.
(08:41):
And I collect voucherspecimens.
So voucher specimens, I think,are critical for any kind of
plant work you're doing becauseit documents what you have, and
then we can actually physicallylook at it again later.
And in this case, it becamesuper critical.
We'd found the Cates MountainClover and we were documenting
the surrounding vegetation inaddition to this plant, which I
(09:02):
thought was the common bluecurl, and so I collected a
voucher, and then I alsocollected a vine that I had no
idea what it was, and I broughtit back, and we are now putting
QR codes on our labels, whichlink to iNaturalist records.
And that plays in on this onebecause I identified it on
iNaturalist as one of the commonblue curls, and the the expert
(09:26):
for trichostema is uh active oniNaturalist, and he looked at my
photographs and he said, Ithink you've got the
narrow-leaved blue curl.
And so I went back and lookedat the specimen, and absolutely
he was right.
And one of the reasons I didn'toriginally even consider it to
be the rare one is because theonly other sites for this in
(09:47):
Pennsylvania are in the FarEast.
And I was in uh Fulton County,which is in the South Central.
So it is known, I know now thatit's known just across the line
in Maryland, but just lookingat Pennsylvania, it wasn't
anywhere near there.
So I didn't even cross my mindthat it could be the rare one.
And then when I came back andbrought the vine that we found,
(10:07):
we discovered that it was aplant, a galactea, that hadn't
been seen in Pennsylvania forlike a hundred years.
Incredible.
And this, the previous knownvoucher specimen for it, was
like 80 or 90 years.
There was a site record for it20 or 30 years ago, but there's
no voucher specimen, so I can'tverify if that's really what it
was or not.
Gotcha.
Michael Pisano (10:26):
So you're setting up someone, hopefully,
in the future with these voucherspecimens to be able to go
back.
Bonnie Isaac (10:31):
Absolutely.
I mean, that's what I like todo, is I'm looking at historic
voucher records and then I'mtrying to go back to those same
sites and see if the rare andendangered plants are still
there and if the habitat isstill intact.
And that's an issue with a lotof our rare plants is that
there's been habitat destructionor habitats being taken over by
non-native species.
Michael Pisano (10:50):
And so with this specific blue curl, can you
tell me what kind of factorslead into it being endangered in
this state?
Bonnie Isaac (10:56):
Part of it is that it is it occurs on Appalachian
shale barons, which is an in uhfairly rare habitat, which the
clover that I was looking for,the Cates Mountain clover, is
also an endangered species inPennsylvania because it is a
limited habitat in the state.
Michael Pisano (11:12):
Aaron Powell What makes this kind of barons
habitat less common than maybeit once was?
Bonnie Isaac (11:17):
People building on them, you know, bulldozers.
Michael Pisano (11:20):
Sure, development.
Bonnie Isaac (11:21):
Development, yeah.
Michael Pisano (11:22):
Um and can you kind of speak to, I guess, other
you you've already mentioned afew, but other reasons um that
plants become endangered?
I mean, I just I feel likethey're so left out of
conservation narratives.
Um I'd be curious to kind offill that in a little bit.
Bonnie Isaac (11:39):
Yeah, the the main reasons why plants become
endangered is one, it could havejust been a rare thing to begin
with.
Sure.
You know, but two, there is thedevelopment issue, and there,
you know, which is uh habitatdestruction.
You know, so a lot of placeswhere the rare plants grow are
things, you know, places where,like, you know, if it's a
limestone cliff and we needlimestone to make cement or
(12:01):
whatever, you know, so it couldbe mining.
It and a lot of the barons havespecial minerals in them, so
they do get mined.
And so there's can there'sdevelopment, there's invasion,
there's just people not knowingand mowing it for their lawn,
which was one of the sites.
The the site record for this,we went back to visit, and the
guy had been mowing everything.
(12:22):
So that's so tough.
Michael Pisano (12:24):
Yeah, it's gotta be kind of heartbreaking.
Bonnie Isaac (12:26):
Yeah, but you know, it's private property and
in in most states, yeah, thelandowner owns the plant.
Got it.
And they can do what they want.
Michael Pisano (12:34):
Sure.
And you know, you're coming upagainst a pretty entrenched
culture of how people manageland.
Bonnie Isaac (12:40):
Yeah.
And most people just areunaware.
They don't really know thatthere is even a possibility that
there's a rare plant there.
Because you normally, if youfind a landowner and you talk to
them about the rare plant, youtell them it's there, then
they're like, oh, that's cool.
You know, and then they'llmaybe protect it.
But there are also landownersthat are like, I don't want that
here because maybe thegovernment will tell me what to
do with my land.
(13:00):
And so they remove them onpurpose.
Michael Pisano (13:03):
Interesting.
Wow.
I would not have thought thathappened.
Um, but of course, Iunderstand.
Um, again, I guess I feel like,you know, these I don't hear
many stories about rare plants,endangered plants, right?
There's obviously like acharismatic megafauna uh
monopoly on a lot ofconservation narratives, which
is not to say that, you know,those are bad narratives or that
(13:24):
they don't protect the habitatsthat also contain rare plants
or rare insects or lesscharismatic things.
But I am kind of curious aboutwhat you would each well, maybe
we'll start personally.
Like, what's charismatic aboutthis plant to you?
And what's charismatic aboutthis plant to you?
Maybe we'll start with you,Mason.
Mason Heberling (13:42):
Jeez.
Michael Pisano (13:42):
Yeah.
Mason Heberling (13:42):
Uh I mean, I don't know because I must say I
don't know this species.
Um hearing Bonnie's story isbeautiful and I have a respect
for it.
I think every species kind ofhas a story to tell.
And even at the local level,every kind of local environment,
the the different organisms init really do have a story to
tell.
And the closer you kind of lookand pay attention, I think that
(14:03):
there's a certain level ofinspiration there.
Um that's kind of my general umphilosophy on it.
I feel like even the mostboring of plants that you might
think is boring and unexcitingupon closer inspection has
something really interestingabout it.
It could be, you know, how it'spollinated or how it grows or
its life cycle or the color ofits flowers or the diversity of
(14:27):
the different leaf shapes andsizes within the same species.
I mean, the list goes on andon, so I feel like there's just
like a ton to observe.
And dare I say plants are thelandscape, so there's a lot of
um, there's a lot to work from.
And without without plants, um,our landscape is um
non-existent, really.
Bonnie Isaac (14:46):
So without plants, life on earth would be pretty
much non-existent.
You know, we we we very muchrely on plants.
They're the basis of our foodchain.
Um, we're all wearingplant-based clothing.
We breathe oxygen, which isthanks to plants.
Our houses are made out ofplant material.
Mason Heberling (15:07):
I mean, we pretty much other organisms rely
on plants too.
Yeah.
Right.
Pretty fabulous.
So yeah.
Bonnie Isaac (15:14):
Yeah, it's I mean, it's the base.
unknown (15:16):
Yeah.
Michael Pisano (15:16):
Uh I'll take I'll take us back to that
question that I posed to Mason.
I'm curious why you personally,you know, outside of those
obvious I couldn't be alive andthis planet wouldn't be here
enough.
Mason Heberling (15:27):
Is that not a good enough for you?
Bonnie Isaac (15:29):
No, I need more.
You want more.
Okay.
Michael Pisano (15:32):
Like, why should people slow down and and you
know take the time to see thatstory that Mason's talking
about?
Why do you do it?
Bonnie Isaac (15:38):
If you really get close and look at some of the
plants, I mean, when you're justwalking by, it might look like
a green blur.
But if you really stop and getclose, you can see the intricate
details.
I mean, you can see that onthis specimen, the flowers are
not very big.
What are they like?
Maybe a you know, a quarterinch.
But when they're, you know, infull bloom, they have this
absolutely gorgeous spiral curlflower with the anthers and the
(16:02):
you know, stigma sticking out.
And there's usually a story tothat too, that the way the
flower forms is how the insectcan come in and get pollinated
and carry the pollen around.
So it's just it's just anintricate story of how things
interact.
Michael Pisano (16:17):
I bet it's super satisfying too, right?
You've you make that loop, andI think people make those uh
outside of nature very often intheir lives where you gain some
expertise, then you see thething, and you identify and you
say, Oh, I know that.
And yeah, that's a nice, that'sa special feeling.
In terms of kind of practicalsteps, I wonder how we might go
about conserving andrevitalizing populations of this
(16:39):
and other endangered plants.
Bonnie Isaac (16:41):
It's protecting the habitats and you know,
keeping the non-native thingsthat may be crowding them out,
you know, so it's going to beactive management.
I think it would be really niceif we could get some kind of
policy where native plants areprotected, because right now,
like I mentioned, the plants areowned by the landowner, so it's
(17:01):
totally on the landowner tomaintain what they have or to
protect it.
The state can only protectwhat's on state properties.
Right.
You know, so which is prettylimited.
Which is pretty limited.
Mason Heberling (17:13):
Yeah.
But that does place a biggervalue than on public lands, I
suppose, given that context.
Yeah.
Which would not be so bad.
There's something else I wantedto say, actually.
And this was um just to giveBonnie a shout out in
particular, because she's sohumble.
But I would say a big part ofthis too is just inventorying,
no knowing what's out there.
So I mean, if Bonnie didn'tcollect this specimen and have
(17:36):
this story, we wouldn't knowpotentially that that population
was there.
I like to think that's part ofour contributions, our
professional contributions tothe story is really this
baseline of what's there, when,and why.
And I think that knowledge isof course important to then
inform these some of thesehigher-level complicated
decisions.
But if we don't know that it'sthere, then kind of flying
(17:57):
blind.
Michael Pisano (17:58):
Right.
And that has been proven inland management and wildlife
management to not be thegreatest way to fly.
Um, same in a plane.
I would also say that thatdata, the baselines, are what
policymakers will end up lookingat.
They're not here in theherbarium looking at each
specimen or in the woodsthinking about those plants.
They're reading that aggregate.
And so, yeah, I reallyappreciate you bringing that up.
(18:19):
And I think if there's anythingelse you want to say, because I
know the collections are kindof you've been here working with
them for a long time.
Is there any other somethingyou want to say about uh you
know how these collectionscontribute to conservation
efforts for native plants andmaybe more broadly to bolster
environmental health?
Bonnie Isaac (18:38):
As Mason mentioned, you know, every
specimen has a story to tell.
But by looking at where theplants occurred and when they
occurred there, we can actuallytrack, you know, the
distributions of the rare plantsand the common plants and what
common plants might be gettingrarer, or what rare plants could
actually be getting more commonbased on, you know, maybe
(18:59):
environmental change or habitatmanipulation.
Because there are some plantsthat we thought were rare, but
they really like disturbance,and there's a lot of disturbance
going on now, so some of thoseare expanding.
So it's not necessarily thatbecause it was endangered, it's
always going to be endangered,because it just with habitat
manipulation, things arechanging.
The flora is dynamic, and theherbarium is basically our way
(19:21):
of documenting that.
We can document and see how theflora is changing over time and
over distance and throughoutthe world, really.
Michael Pisano (19:30):
Excellent.
And yeah, make informeddecisions about what to do to be
good neighbors to all of it.
Excellent.
I do want to move on to thisother specimen that we have
here.
Mackenzie Kimmel (19:49):
Collection item two is a small squished
snipping of a plant that easilygrows past 10 feet tall.
Often mistaken for bamboo.
Its edible shoots aresegmented, hollow, and
broad-like.
Its heart-shaped leaves arearranged alternately, meaning
(20:11):
only one grows from each node onthe stem, and they alternate
between opposite sides.
This collection item was likelytaken from a dense,
thicket-like stand, which thisspecies is known to form,
especially alongside bodies ofwater.
(20:32):
This herbarium sample includesthe plant's bright white
clusters of delicate bushyflowers, which are reminiscent
of a pointalistic painting intheir flattened form.
Can you identify collectionitem two?
Mason Heberling (20:57):
So here is kind of a slightly more tinged paper
than Bonnie's, slightly olderspecimen collected in 1920.
Some kind of medium-sizedleaves smashed to the on the
sheet with some seeds, somefruits there, and a stem, and
it's a pretty full sheet,otherwise.
Collected September 18th, 1920.
This is a knotweed specimencollected by Otto Jennings.
(21:19):
And on the handwritten label itsays Established and Forming
Thickets along Lowry's Run aboveEmsworth, Allegheny County.
unknown (21:27):
Wow.
Bonnie Isaac (21:28):
Just a curious note that it just you just said
September 18th, 1920.
Is that today?
No, it was yesterday.
This one was collectedSeptember 18th, 2020.
They were exactly a hundredyears apart.
Mason Heberling (21:40):
We actually didn't.
Bonnie Isaac (21:42):
It was totally accidental.
They were a hundred yearsapart.
Mason Heberling (21:44):
We didn't plan that.
Bonnie Isaac (21:46):
It's kind of um 100 years ago yesterday.
Michael Pisano (21:50):
Type of wonderful coincidence that could
only happen in this room.
That's very cool.
Bonnie Isaac (21:58):
Exactly a hundred years apart.
Mason Heberling (22:00):
So that's fun.
Um but yeah, so kind of this iskind of the opposite side of
the coin of um Bonnie's exampleof a species of conservation
concern.
This is kind of the opposite.
It's a non-native species alsoof conservation concern, but
because of the impact that thisspecies has on the native flora.
Michael Pisano (22:19):
And before we get into talking about its story
as an introduced species, I dowant, I'd love to hear about it
as a species.
Because I think most peoplehear knotweed, they have a
feeling, yeah, they have avision of it, but uh, you know,
living where we live here in theUnited States, we don't know
about it in its native range.
Yeah.
Can you just tell me about thisas a plant?
Mason Heberling (22:39):
Yeah, it is a species that has a long history,
I guess I would say, a longhuman history.
But the the plant kind ofspecies complex can be found in
East Asia.
So China, Korea, Japan, and theRussian Far East.
So also a temperate forestecosystem like ours, but on the
other side of the world.
A lot of people don't in thenative range don't necessarily
(23:01):
think too much about it, to behonest, which is kind of an
interesting thing consideringits commonness here and and um
not so much in its native range.
The complexities, the socialhuman complexities of
non-nativeness.
But if you didn't know ofnon-native, I mean you might
actually quite you you wouldhave a different, perhaps a
different opinion of the of theplant just seeing it, because it
(23:22):
does form very dense thickets,especially along like riparian
areas, along the rivers ofPittsburgh, for instance.
There was a vine that swallowedthe south or whatever.
I would say this might be a uman herbaceous shrubby thing that
swallowed Pittsburgh.
I don't know for sure.
Um, but it's quite quitefascinating, and it's got a
really interesting um taxonomy,biology to it.
(23:44):
Um, so in Pittsburgh, we kindof are this um, dare I say, this
haven for this incrediblemorphological and perhaps
genetic diversity of thisspecies complex.
So we have um the two parentspecies, um, giant knotweed, um,
Japanese knotweed, what we callJapanese knotweed.
Um, and then they alsohybridize, which is Bohemian
(24:06):
knotweed.
And in fact, this is has beenidentified as Bohemian knotweed,
the example I have um here infront of us.
So there's kind of like thishuge range of morphological
variation, leaf size.
So giant giant knotweed hasgiant leaves.
Japanese more kind of circular,come to a tip, and then the
then they hybridize and there'skind of variation.
(24:27):
Even within stands, there'sconsiderable variation.
But it's really quiteimpressive how how the plant
grows and spreads and how itseems to do pretty well in a lot
of different contexts.
I mean, sometimes you look at astand and you might think, oh,
what could have been here?
But in all reality, I don'tknow.
Some of the locations are whatcould have been here?
I don't know.
Not without significantrestoration because the site has
(24:50):
been kind of muddied up in avariety of ways.
It's kind of impressive thatthe plant is doing so well.
Michael Pisano (24:55):
And is uh the presence of a plant there at
maybe like a fringe of where aplant is comfortable growing in
our region, is that remediatingthat space at all for another
plant?
Or no, no, that's not reallythe case.
Mason Heberling (25:08):
No, not really.
I don't think I'd becomfortable saying that.
I don't really think so.
Um, so at one of my fieldsites, there there are like an
actually an impressive amount ofwildflowers, forest wildflowers
growing under some knotweed.
And we're studying that, but wereally think it's kind of an
ephemeral, a short-term thing,and probably um things in the in
the understory of this shrubprobably would be much happier
(25:30):
without um the competition fromthe knotweed, and probably the
long-term, long-term outcomeprobably won't be great for
those plants growing underthere, but it is kind of an
interesting, it's an interestingdynamic.
Michael Pisano (25:42):
Culturally, this word invasive has some baggage
to it.
I've heard some scientistsreally trying to get away from
the term itself.
I'd just love to hear yourthoughts on you know the
dynamics there, and for maybepeople who haven't heard that
discourse.
What how is it shifting?
How is talking about invasivesmore nuanced than it was 10
years ago?
Mason Heberling (26:00):
Yeah, for sure.
I don't know.
It's really complicated, Iguess I would say.
And it's something we're likereally exploring here.
We have a um an ongoing activeongoing project about invasive
species communication.
And that originally startedwhen we redid the um some of the
labels in the hall of botanyhere at the museum with these
fantastic dioramas of differentvegetation biomes of North
America.
(26:21):
They're really like, reallybeautifully done.
As we were writing, updatingthe labels as an invasion
biologist, somebody who studiesintroduced plants myself.
I figured, oh, we should writesomething in the labels to kind
of at least bring up this topicof non-native introduced plants.
Because actually, what was inthe label before was something
along the lines of herbsescaping a garden might become a
(26:42):
fragrant addition to thelandscape, was in there.
And I so I was like, ah, that'san that's an interesting take
on it.
But then, so then anyway, we wewrote some very short text that
actually was on Japaneseknotweed.
You know, something along thelines of, you know, Japanese
knotweed is is introduced, isnow quite common along
Pittsburgh's waterways, orsomething along those lines.
And then some others at themuseum, you know, as we're like
(27:04):
reading the labels.
This also was around the timeof um a lot of anti-immigration
sentiments in the US.
So it was kind of like, ooh, Imean, it wasn't our intent, but
we also didn't want a museumvisitor to perhaps misread that
or take it a step further, thatwe don't want Japanese people
here, for instance, or veryxenophobic or something.
(27:26):
So that kind of brought it tomy attention, I guess.
I had very much had my narrowlens on of seeing um introduced
plant, you know, all aboutnatives and all against
non-natives in terms of thiskind of binary and and thinking,
you know, even if this plantsaren't, we don't know that
they're doing bad right now,they they will eventually kind
of like kind of thing.
And so now as I think about itmore and more, I realize that
(27:48):
the language that we use aroundinvasives, which I'm I'm okay
with the term invasive, I willsay, but kind of how we talk
about it, and maybe it'simportant to put it in context
and to also kind of frame it ina way that is not that is
inclusive and not um xenophobic.
And in fact, one of the ways iswhat you did is kind of talking
about the plant as a, you know,an invasive, you know, as a
(28:09):
plant and not vilifying theplant per se, but instead
actually taking a step back andnot being like Japanese
knotweed, what a horrible plantthat's taking over, but instead
be like, you know, humans, whathave we done to bring this plant
here and to make like, youknow, the plant is not to blame.
So this kind of villainizationof the plant, I think, is is one
way around it.
And in fact, realizing thatit's not the fault of the anyone
(28:32):
from Asia, even, right?
It's um it's the fault of transof transport and this species.
We could probably talk for anhour easily about the the um the
introduction history of thisplant.
Michael Pisano (28:52):
The U.S.
Department of Agriculture'sformal definition of an invasive
species is, quote, an alienspecies whose introduction does
or is likely to cause economicor environmental harm or harm to
human health, end quote.
I wonder, by the USDA's formaldefinition, what else in the
American landscape becomesinvasive when viewed through the
(29:14):
lens of the current ecologicalcrisis?
For example, climate science isclear that industrial-scale
monocultures of non-native soy,corn, wheat, cattle, pigs, and
lawn-their crises all causeenvironmental harm.
The concept of invasiveness iscontextual, and it merits an
update if we actually want todeal with the material problems
(29:37):
posed by some neobiota.
The current approach of checkyour boots or kill it with fire
is frankly insufficient for someof the really vigorous invasive
species, like knotweed, theones with a special talent to
overwhelm, outcompete, andotherwise wreak havoc.
Which brings us to colonialism.
Invasive species.
(30:00):
Both the large-scalehuman-driven global spread of
organisms and the concept arelegacies of colonialism.
Take the post-1492 ColombianExchange.
Picture European ships bringinglivestock and seeds to remake
the new world in the image ofthe old.
What else could our landscapelook like?
(30:54):
The word invader carries itsown meaning, an implication of
malicious intent to seize andconsume and remake a foreign
image.
Exactly the colonizer's ethosthat logged the American old
growth, tried to eradicate thebuffalo, and committed genocide
against indigenous Americans tomake way for European grasses
(31:14):
and livestock and lifestyles.
Colonialism is inextricablefrom the problems and concepts
of invasive species, not tomention from natural history as
a whole.
And so solving the materialproblems with invasive species
(31:37):
must include decolonizing ourresponse.
A decolonized relationship isone of coexistence, not control.
It's collaboration betweenpeoples, disciplines, and
species towards mutual benefit.
It's creating new practicestogether in service of
collectively established goals,setting aside old ideas that no
(32:01):
longer serve us, to make roomfor what might be born next.
This is not to say that weshould just believe the
knotweed, the lanternflies, thetrees of heaven, to do what they
will unimpeded.
Rather, it's to say that ourresponse to the alien should be
based in our curiosity, notfear, and in what we can create
(32:24):
instead of what we must destroy.
Importantly, this meansgathering many voices at the
table, especially indigenousvoices, to find the right way
forward.
So please take all of this witha grain of salt.
That's just my personalcontribution to what needs to be
a collaborative conversation.
We must learn to care for thenative plants that are stressed
(32:48):
by the presence of aliencompetitors.
We cannot completely shut outneobiota.
Globalized trade isn't about togrind to a halt, so it will
continue to shuffle speciesaround.
And as the climate shifts,species ranges are shifting with
it, including the plant speciesthat we rely on for food.
We will need to accommodatethese range shifts and find ways
(33:11):
to welcome climate refugees.
This work doesn't need to waitfor permits, policy, or
approvals, nor should we expectanyone else to handle it.
Biodiversity needs investmentfrom many hands, and there's no
better time than now.
In focusing on plants and theirrich, small, interconnected
(33:31):
world, our interconnected smallhands have ability to make huge
differences.
By electing activeparticipation, we can uncover
our potential as a greatconstructive force for good.
This is an old specimen.
(33:55):
I would have thought thatNotweed was more uh introduced
by globalization in maybe thelast 30, 40 years, but I am
wrong.
Tell me.
Mason Heberling (34:05):
Yeah, well in Pittsburgh, I mean this is so I
guess I should have said too,this is the earliest specimen.
We actually have a couplespecimens from around this year,
but it's the earliest specimenthat we have for the Pittsburgh
region.
But in North America it wasintroduced much earlier, so like
the 1860s.
But its history is definitelyvery colonial and probably
multiple points of introduction,but into the horticultural
(34:27):
trade.
So at a time when Europeans inparticular were um interested in
bringing new plants back,either for their beauty or for
human use in other ways, in morepractical ways.
But yeah, this plant wasbrought to um actually to the
Netherlands from Japan in the1800s, kind of made it into the
horticultural industry, wasactually just sent to um Q in
(34:47):
the UK, and then it was thenintroduced subsequently to the
US from the UK.
But then there also is someevidence that there's some
direct introductions too fromJapan directly to the US.
So it's quite complicated, andthere's a lot of different
genetics.
So it's said that you knowEurope is largely one maternal
clone and doesn't produce seedquite as much as in North
(35:10):
America.
Um so in some regards theyhybridize post-introduction as
well, perhaps in different waysthan they would in their native
range, too.
But in terms of like invasivesor non-natives in general, I
just think Yeah, there's a lotto it.
There's a lot of nuance abouthow we talk about it, and also
kind of on one hand, you know,being inclusive and kind of you
know being careful about how wetalk about them, but on the
(35:32):
other hand, also kind ofcommunicating the the real
environmental concern thatnon-natives do pose.
And so by invasives versusnon-natives, I could maybe give
a little definition there as youknow, non-natives is are
organisms that are don't have anevolutionary origin in the in
the region.
Right.
And then upon introduction,they may or may not be able to
(35:54):
sustain without human, withouthuman intervention in gardens,
for instance, or farms.
But sometimes they spreadeither on purpose or or
accidentally and becomenaturalized.
So these are species that asubset of these introduced
species that can formself-sustaining populations, so
they can grow in the wild andand reproduce seed or however
(36:15):
they spread.
And then a subset of those arethese, is are this kind of
invasive group, which is a muchsmaller subset.
And it's the invasive groupthat is like of most concern
because by definition, these arespecies that are actively
spreading across the landscapeand cause some sort of economic
or ecological harm.
So oftentimes we think of weedsas being, you know, a plant out
(36:38):
of place, which may or may nothave an economical, you know, it
might be a pain in your garden,or it might be an economic
problem in the farm field, whichhas huge implications.
Or like this species, forinstance, has certainly an
economic cost, but definitely anecological cost for the reasons
that we said before, you know,crowding out natives or changing
the landscape in a variety ofways.
(36:59):
Yeah.
Michael Pisano (37:00):
Which has these ripple effects through the
ecosystem, definitely.
I'm glad you brought up theword weed, I think, while we
were kind of on words, just fora second.
The word weed is included inplant names.
What do you what do you think?
Bonnie Isaac (37:13):
Well, the definition of weed is a plant
that occurs where you don't wantit.
Speaker 4 (37:17):
Yeah.
unknown (37:18):
Okay.
Bonnie Isaac (37:18):
And so and bringing it up as as part of the
common name is a whole notherissue because common names vary
from different localities.
Right.
And a lot of times the commonname for the plant has nothing
to do with what the plantactually is.
So I personally don't know thatthere are any weeds per se,
(37:39):
because I like all plants, evenif they're native, non-native,
because they're interesting.
You know, it's like, why isthat here?
How did it get here?
You know, so there are a lot ofplants in my yard that I wish
were not there.
Sure.
But I'm still like, how didthey get there?
You know, and it it fascinatesme, things like how garlic
mustard and stiltgrass, how theyspread so fast.
(38:01):
I it just it's mind-blowing tome how fast they spread.
And a lot of people considerthose weeds, and if they're a
plant that's where we don't wantthem, then by definition it is
a weed.
But having the word weed in thecommon name is that's uh kind
of a colonial thing there too.
Mason Heberling (38:17):
Right, like milkweed, for instance.
I think the whole um the Ithink there's been a changing
narrative around like milkweedin particular with monarchs and
things.
Um so I think I think the theterm weed is not quite, maybe
not quite what it was, you know,several decades ago because
maybe because of milkweed, Idon't know, or this embrace of
plants.
Michael Pisano (38:38):
Hopefully, yeah.
I think I still encounterplenty of people who hear weed
in a plant's name and say, oh,like why would I buy that?
Coming back to knotweed.
Yes.
Uh I'm curious from both ofyou.
You know, you hinted at thisidea of like being curious about
why something pops up in youryard.
Um, what do you kind of takeaway from the predicament around
(38:58):
knotweed and its presence here?
Bonnie Isaac (39:01):
That's kind of a loaded question.
Um I I really pass.
Sure.
Speaker 4 (39:10):
Mason, you've got to meditate.
Mason Heberling (39:12):
Well, I'm fascinated by it, and I'm like
shifting a lot of my researchtowards this species in
particular.
You know, it has a fascinatingbiology, a fascinating
introduction history, um, andalso it's it's an interesting
predicament.
And what do we do about theproblem of even just this one
species, for instance?
I mean, it's a species that iskind of like hard to control.
(39:32):
So that's what people ask.
Again, I don't really know thatthat much about it.
I'm not like a practitioner,um, but people will ask, you
know, how do you control it?
And it's like, well, kind ofthe latest recommendation is a
herbicide spray at a particular,I mean, there's some science
around it at a particular time.
So late season herbicide spray,no cutting.
They find if you cut it, theplant actually seems to do
(39:54):
better because it's maybe not tobetter, but it's it's
encourages its spread, which isnot what you want.
So there are there is like acareful management thereof.
But it's hard when you look atlike, I mean, acres and acres of
knotweed, and it's kind oflike, well, is the solution to
spread?
Like, what's our goal here?
Is it eradication?
Is it specific management?
I mean, I think a lot of thecommunication, I think it's a
(40:15):
great kind of poster species onthe importance of understanding
that us humans have a big impacton how plants spread and
preventing new invasions, butalso a more kind of curating,
also like doing management in avery targeted way, though.
Because I think I don't thinkthe goal is to spray all of
Pennsylvania with herbicidesonce a year continually.
(40:37):
So there is, and you know, thenof course that also brings up
some people are veryanti-spraying, some people are
are you know for it.
Like, I don't know, it bringsup all of this these things.
And in fact, this last summer,it was it was pretty, it was
pretty fun and interesting.
There's a a knotweed festivalin southwestern Pennsylvania,
and we had a table there.
It was it was really kind ofcool just to talk about the
(40:58):
species and what it what itmeans to people.
Like a lot of people also haveno idea why the festival is
called the Knotweed Festival, sothat was kind of a fun thing to
bring to it, be like, well,look, and this is when it was
introduced in the region, andda-da-da-da, and that's what it
is.
And they're like, Oh, yeah, Iknow that, I've seen that.
But also, you know, othersbring up positive things about
knotweed, like, ooh, it flowersat a time when my honeybees
(41:20):
don't have as many flowers andwe love knotweed honey.
And so it adds this like extralayer of like, you know, am I
supposed to uh, you know, likeyeah, place that in some into
some context and not um, yeah, Idon't think we should be
propagating knotweed for honeyproduction.
So yeah.
Bonnie Isaac (41:39):
I mean, it is taking over habitat of native
plants and some that areendangered, you know.
Yeah.
So it's it's discouraging someof our native plants that we're
trying to encourage.
Michael Pisano (41:52):
It's clearly here, though, and it's not
simple for it to not be here.
It's ingrained in our culture,I'm hearing.
That those aren't the reasonsto let other things fall away.
So this is clearly tricky.
You know, I think um to wrapthings up, I would like to kind
of zoom out and think around asimilar theme.
Um, envisioning a world, Iguess, in which humans have
(42:15):
worked out some better ways ofrelating to plants.
What do you see?
What's kind of a vision of uh,let's just say, a city for an
easy boundary, this city thatyou know people are getting
along better with plants,they're helping that
foundational part of the ecologyand being better neighbors to
it.
Bonnie Isaac (42:33):
Well, one of the things that we could do to be
better neighbors for plants inthat is to not give people
tickets for not mowing theiryard and encouraging native
plants so that we have nativepollinators, birds, and native
animals have passageways to getfrom one block of woods to
another, you know, so that wecan like encourage their habitat
(42:54):
to be nicer for all of us.
Michael Pisano (42:56):
Punish people for something that's probably
not, you know.
Bonnie Isaac (43:00):
No, not punish people for doing things that are
probably good for theenvironment, more than mowing
and having acres and acres ofmonoculture grass where you're
not going to have very manybirds or insects, you know.
So we just need to encouragegovernments to uh encourage
citizens to take care of theecosystem.
Michael Pisano (43:21):
Gotcha.
So in this kind of utopian,plant-friendly city, we've got
top levels of you know systemsthat say, hey, it's good for you
to do this and you disseminatethe right uh information instead
of maybe some outdated ideasabout keeping nature at bay or
out.
Right.
Wonderful.
Yes.
Mason Heberling (43:40):
What do you see in this city?
Yeah, what Bonnie said.
Um yeah, no, I mean I thinkalso just the importance of of
green space, I think, for forboth for human health but also
for plant health.
I think they're kind of one andthe same a lot of times.
And so trees are good.
Trees are good in a lot ofdifferent ways.
The importance of just havingshade is is um becoming even
(44:03):
more important.
So yeah, but that's not to sayit doesn't like come without
work, and in in today's today'sworld, I mean it comes with some
intent.
So it's not just to say, oh letlet's reduce the amount of
pavement and just let thingshappen.
Because in the case of likelike knotweed, for instance, and
and other things, um, it's kindof hard to look at concrete,
you know, parking lot area andsay, we should have all these,
(44:26):
like this this is a nativehabitat.
Like what I don't know,ultimately, like the city isn't
a quote native habitat.
Right.
It is a very different habitat.
So we can't like get upset thatwe can't plant this rare plant
that Monty has in in the parkinglot of the museum.
But I would think we there arecertain kind of urban planning
things that could be done tomake it such that we have green
(44:47):
spaces that maybe plants likelike this can flourish even in
urban settings, but also justmaximizing the amount of local
ecology that can happen in acity.
And I think through green spaceand your own lawn has an
important contribution, it'spretty surprising just planting
a couple, a couple hot plantsfor pollinators and hummingbirds
that they show up even in themiddle of the city.
(45:09):
Yeah, it really is kind of likeeach vote counts, and in this
case, it really does.
It's like doesn't take much,honestly, and then it's
addicting.
And if you've got a good thinggoing, the plant, the plants
also.
I mean, I say it's you know,you kind of have to do some
curation, but it really does thethe plants do it themselves and
they spread on their own, andlike it's a miracle.
Michael Pisano (45:29):
It's the original vegetative miracle,
right?
It's like there's something soyou know ecologically beautiful
and you know that we rely on,but it's also spiritually
extremely filling, I think, tobe surrounded by plants.
And um we really miss out.
Bonnie Isaac (45:44):
I think there have been studies done that show
that people who go outside andinteract with plants are
healthier.
unknown (45:50):
Definitely.
Michael Pisano (45:50):
Yeah, no doubt about it.
Um great.
And so just to kind of take usout, are there any people
already doing some aspects ofthat good work that you want to
plug or you know, say, hey, ifyou want to get involved in
this, you're not sure where tostart, you don't have to do it
alone.
Who should we look to?
Mason Heberling (46:06):
Support your native nurseries, I guess I
would say, and support your landtrusts, your local um parks and
and things like that.
Bonnie Isaac (46:14):
Right here in Pittsburgh, we have Tree
Pittsburgh, which will help gettrees out and about.
Mason Heberling (46:18):
And you know, in the Pittsburgh area, we also
have like Allegheny Land Trust,for instance, Audubon Society,
Western Pennsylvania has a uhnative plant center, for
instance, and they provide a lotof important information as
well.
There are resources out therethat are only increasing, and
they'll increase with with yourand with your interest, you
know.
Michael Pisano (46:39):
Excellent.
Thank you both so much forspending this time taking us
again behind the scenes of thecollection.
Appreciate you both.
unknown (46:46):
Thank you.
Bonnie Isaac (46:47):
Thank you.
Michael Pisano (46:54):
Approximately 550,000 thanks to Bonnie and
Mason for inviting us into theCarnegie's botany collection and
to the amazing plants thereinfor inspiring us to grow towards
better futures.
This whole season of We AreNature was recorded in one of
the museum's barbarian spaces,just about 15 feet away from
Mason's office.
(47:14):
Mason, many, many thanks to youand the rest of the botany crew
for your most excellenthospitality.
We are Nature is produced byNicole Heller and Sloan McRae.
It's recorded at CarnegieMuseum of Natural History by
Matt Unger and Garrett Schmidt.
DJ Thermos makes the music.
Mackenzie Kimmel describes thecollection items, and Garrett
(47:35):
Schmidt and Michael Paisano.
That's me for edit the podcast.
Thanks for listening.
You're listening to the Anthropocene Archives, a
presentation of We Are Nature.
In this special series ofstories, we're delving deep into
Carnegie Museum of NaturalHistory's 22 million collection
items, raiding cabinets andcases, sifting through objects
and organisms in search ofstories of stewardship,
solutions, and scientificwonder.
On today's episode, anendangered narrowly local, a
(00:35):
thriving garden fugitive, andgratitude for our green world.
We're hanging in the herbariumwith two unbeliefable botanists.
So turn it to the volume.
This'll be an episode toremember.
Welcome to We Are Nature, ashow about natural history and
(00:55):
livable futures presented byCarnegie Museum of Natural
History.
I'm your host, photosynthesisMVR Michael Pizzano, and today
I'm joined by two botanyexperts.
Friends will you pleaseintroduce yourselves?
Bonnie Isaac (01:05):
Hi, my name is Bonnie Isaac.
I am the collection managerhere at the Carnegie Museum of
Natural History.
I've been here since 1989, andmy area of interest is
endangered and rare plants ofPennsylvania.
Mason Heberling (01:20):
Wonderful.
And?
My name is Mason Heberling.
I'm the Associate Curator ofBotany here at Carnegie Museum
of Natural History.
My research is pretty broad.
I'm interested in kind ofglobal change, environmental
change, impacts on plants, inparticular invasive plants, and
also impacts of climate change.
Michael Pisano (01:36):
Perfect.
Thank you both so much forjoining us and for bringing us
behind the scenes of the botanycollection here.
And I was wondering if just tokick us off, you could tell us a
little bit about the museum'splant collections.
Bonnie Isaac (01:47):
Yeah, we have around 550,000 specimens from
all over the world.
They are all pressed and driedand glued down to archival
quality paper with a label on itthat says what it is, where it
was collected, and who collectedit.
Michael Pisano (02:00):
That's incredible.
And can you tell me about thekind of time scale that this was
collected over?
Bonnie Isaac (02:05):
Our earliest collections are from the late
1700s.
Our most recent collections arefrom like yesterday.
Michael Pisano (02:14):
And it seems like there's um a pretty
consistent methodology here.
Can you describe kind of whatwe're looking at here in terms
of this preparation in anherbarium?
Bonnie Isaac (02:24):
What we do is we will collect the specimen that
we're interested in and we willput it in a plant press, which
consists of newspaper andcardboards, and we will press
them and then put them in frontof a heater fan to dry them.
If we dry them quick, they'llkeep their color better and
they'll retain their DNA.
And so once we have thempressed and dried, then we will
glue them or linen strap tapethem onto archival quality paper
(02:49):
so that we can store them inall these beautiful cabinets.
Michael Pisano (02:52):
Do you have a sense of how many of these types
of specimens you've prepared?
Bonnie Isaac (02:56):
I do not.
I personally have collectedabout 30,000 specimens.
Michael Pisano (03:02):
Wow, that's incredible.
And so you said 550,000 here inthe museum.
That is a pretty incredibleamount of plants, obviously, but
I'm sure it kind of pales incomparison to the species of
plants, the biodiversity outthere in the world.
Can one of you tell me kind ofabout what we think the plant
biodiversity out there isglobally?
Mason Heberling (03:22):
So it depends who you ask, but probably the
number of taxa or number ofdifferent species of plants in
the world is somewhere on theorder of 350,000, give or take.
Depends again who you ask andhow you splice up what's a
species and what's not aspecies, and that's constantly
changing.
New species are always beingdescribed.
What we know is now what youknow what was two species may
(03:45):
become one, and vice versa.
So it's an ever-changing thing,and that's why the herbarium's
important for that.
Michael Pisano (03:50):
Yeah, speak a little bit more about that.
Like I know that it's almost animpossibly infinite answer,
maybe, but maybe there'ssomething you can do with it.
Like, I'm curious about thetypes of research that can be
done from this sort of specimen.
Mason Heberling (04:03):
So there are many uses of herbarium
specimens, some of which we areonly recently kind of realizing
or appreciating.
So when the kind of institutionof herberia, which is the
plural of herbarium, kind ofbegan, you know, probably, you
know, in the 1600s, give ortake, really was about plant
exploration, right?
And also the novelty of plantsgrowing far away.
(04:25):
This is from a Europeanperspective.
Right.
A couple decades in, it reallydid become a very strongly
scientific enterprise, and thatis naming, describing,
cataloging plant diversityacross the world.
And so that kind of core use ofspecimens remains.
So kind of taxonomy, namingplants, where plants grow, where
(04:46):
plants can be found, whereplants were found, which I'm
guessing we might talk abouthere later.
And so that's kind of the coreis taxonomy and systematics.
And that's kind of what youthink of usually when you think
of a specimen or a naturalhistory museum in general.
But there's a lot more thanthat that's that has been
happening.
So though that's remained thecore, a lot of other uses, so in
particular, kind of ecology, sousing these specimens in some
(05:10):
ways, um, it kind of actsthey're kind of accidental in a
way.
So we can look at likeflowering times as one instance,
you know, as Bonnie said, eachplant has the label of where it
was collected, when it wascollected, with physical
material.
So there's kind of a lot thatyou can do with that looking at
in particular looking at change,but not only looking at change.
So in the case of phonology, Imean, by phonology, we mean kind
(05:33):
of the recurring biologicalcycles in nature.
So, you know, bird migration,for instance, or in the case of
plants, plant flowering times,or leafout times, or leaf drop
times.
So from these specimens, wehave a record of if the plant
was flowering at a given timeand in a given location.
And so, with you know, a coupledozen, hundred, thousand
(05:55):
specimens over the last coupledecades, hundreds of years, we
can look at long-term changes inflowering time.
So, one kind of gut hypothesisis that as springs get warmer,
plants respond by leafing outand flowering earlier and
earlier.
So we can use your variantrecord to look at that kind of
at a species level or even at aregional level.
And then the neat thing aboutthat too is it also kind of
(06:18):
might seem simple, but it'sactually quite complicated.
Different plants respond todifferent phenological cues.
Not all plants respond thesame.
How does their pollinatorsrespond, for instance, or how do
their competitors respond?
So it's kind of this um it'sit's much more complicated than
just earlier springs equalsearlier flowering times.
But that is just one example ofmany, which I could continue um
(06:40):
blathering on with otherexamples.
That's great.
Michael Pisano (06:43):
We'll blather more, I think, throughout the
hour.
Um I'd love to move into thekind of collection items that
we've brought.
And Bonnie, maybe we couldstart with what you've got here.
Mackenzie Kimmel (07:04):
Prior to being flattened and affixed to a
piece of paper, collection itemone grew almost a foot tall from
sandy soil.
Its signature narrow leaves areopposite, meaning they grow in
pairs originating at the samelevel on the stem on opposite
(07:24):
sides.
If you encountered this itembetween September and October,
you might be mesmerized by aunique blue flower.
The blooms and stamens curl upand over the petals in an
elegant swoop.
The anthers are suspended inspace like a pollen-laden lure.
(07:47):
What is collection item one?
Bonnie Isaac (07:57):
This is trichostoma cetaceum, the
narrow-leaved blue curl.
This plant has a blue flowerthat has a nice little curl on
the end, and hence its commonname, blue curls.
It grows on shale barrens, sovery open, hot, dry areas.
We have three species oftrichostoma here in
Pennsylvania.
Two of them are fairly common,and this one is endangered on
(08:20):
the on the state's endangeredlist.
So I was doing some uh surveywork for Kate's Mountain Clover,
which I had a grant to do a fewyears ago, and so we were at a
site where we had there was ahistoric record for Kate's
mountain clover.
And while when I'm out doingrare plant surveys, I like to
look at what are the associatedspecies and what else is there.
(08:41):
And I collect voucherspecimens.
So voucher specimens, I think,are critical for any kind of
plant work you're doing becauseit documents what you have, and
then we can actually physicallylook at it again later.
And in this case, it becamesuper critical.
We'd found the Cates MountainClover and we were documenting
the surrounding vegetation inaddition to this plant, which I
(09:02):
thought was the common bluecurl, and so I collected a
voucher, and then I alsocollected a vine that I had no
idea what it was, and I broughtit back, and we are now putting
QR codes on our labels, whichlink to iNaturalist records.
And that plays in on this onebecause I identified it on
iNaturalist as one of the commonblue curls, and the the expert
(09:26):
for trichostema is uh active oniNaturalist, and he looked at my
photographs and he said, Ithink you've got the
narrow-leaved blue curl.
And so I went back and lookedat the specimen, and absolutely
he was right.
And one of the reasons I didn'toriginally even consider it to
be the rare one is because theonly other sites for this in
(09:47):
Pennsylvania are in the FarEast.
And I was in uh Fulton County,which is in the South Central.
So it is known, I know now thatit's known just across the line
in Maryland, but just lookingat Pennsylvania, it wasn't
anywhere near there.
So I didn't even cross my mindthat it could be the rare one.
And then when I came back andbrought the vine that we found,
(10:07):
we discovered that it was aplant, a galactea, that hadn't
been seen in Pennsylvania forlike a hundred years.
Incredible.
And this, the previous knownvoucher specimen for it, was
like 80 or 90 years.
There was a site record for it20 or 30 years ago, but there's
no voucher specimen, so I can'tverify if that's really what it
was or not.
Gotcha.
Michael Pisano (10:26):
So you're setting up someone, hopefully,
in the future with these voucherspecimens to be able to go
back.
Bonnie Isaac (10:31):
Absolutely.
I mean, that's what I like todo, is I'm looking at historic
voucher records and then I'mtrying to go back to those same
sites and see if the rare andendangered plants are still
there and if the habitat isstill intact.
And that's an issue with a lotof our rare plants is that
there's been habitat destructionor habitats being taken over by
non-native species.
Michael Pisano (10:50):
And so with this specific blue curl, can you
tell me what kind of factorslead into it being endangered in
this state?
Bonnie Isaac (10:56):
Part of it is that it is it occurs on Appalachian
shale barons, which is an in uhfairly rare habitat, which the
clover that I was looking for,the Cates Mountain clover, is
also an endangered species inPennsylvania because it is a
limited habitat in the state.
Michael Pisano (11:12):
Aaron Powell What makes this kind of barons
habitat less common than maybeit once was?
Bonnie Isaac (11:17):
People building on them, you know, bulldozers.
Michael Pisano (11:20):
Sure, development.
Bonnie Isaac (11:21):
Development, yeah.
Michael Pisano (11:22):
Um and can you kind of speak to, I guess, other
you you've already mentioned afew, but other reasons um that
plants become endangered?
I mean, I just I feel likethey're so left out of
conservation narratives.
Um I'd be curious to kind offill that in a little bit.
Bonnie Isaac (11:39):
Yeah, the the main reasons why plants become
endangered is one, it could havejust been a rare thing to begin
with.
Sure.
You know, but two, there is thedevelopment issue, and there,
you know, which is uh habitatdestruction.
You know, so a lot of placeswhere the rare plants grow are
things, you know, places where,like, you know, if it's a
limestone cliff and we needlimestone to make cement or
(12:01):
whatever, you know, so it couldbe mining.
It and a lot of the barons havespecial minerals in them, so
they do get mined.
And so there's can there'sdevelopment, there's invasion,
there's just people not knowingand mowing it for their lawn,
which was one of the sites.
The the site record for this,we went back to visit, and the
guy had been mowing everything.
(12:22):
So that's so tough.
Michael Pisano (12:24):
Yeah, it's gotta be kind of heartbreaking.
Bonnie Isaac (12:26):
Yeah, but you know, it's private property and
in in most states, yeah, thelandowner owns the plant.
Got it.
And they can do what they want.
Michael Pisano (12:34):
Sure.
And you know, you're coming upagainst a pretty entrenched
culture of how people manageland.
Bonnie Isaac (12:40):
Yeah.
And most people just areunaware.
They don't really know thatthere is even a possibility that
there's a rare plant there.
Because you normally, if youfind a landowner and you talk to
them about the rare plant, youtell them it's there, then
they're like, oh, that's cool.
You know, and then they'llmaybe protect it.
But there are also landownersthat are like, I don't want that
here because maybe thegovernment will tell me what to
do with my land.
(13:00):
And so they remove them onpurpose.
Michael Pisano (13:03):
Interesting.
Wow.
I would not have thought thathappened.
Um, but of course, Iunderstand.
Um, again, I guess I feel like,you know, these I don't hear
many stories about rare plants,endangered plants, right?
There's obviously like acharismatic megafauna uh
monopoly on a lot ofconservation narratives, which
is not to say that, you know,those are bad narratives or that
(13:24):
they don't protect the habitatsthat also contain rare plants
or rare insects or lesscharismatic things.
But I am kind of curious aboutwhat you would each well, maybe
we'll start personally.
Like, what's charismatic aboutthis plant to you?
And what's charismatic aboutthis plant to you?
Maybe we'll start with you,Mason.
Mason Heberling (13:42):
Jeez.
Michael Pisano (13:42):
Yeah.
Mason Heberling (13:42):
Uh I mean, I don't know because I must say I
don't know this species.
Um hearing Bonnie's story isbeautiful and I have a respect
for it.
I think every species kind ofhas a story to tell.
And even at the local level,every kind of local environment,
the the different organisms init really do have a story to
tell.
And the closer you kind of lookand pay attention, I think that
(14:03):
there's a certain level ofinspiration there.
Um that's kind of my general umphilosophy on it.
I feel like even the mostboring of plants that you might
think is boring and unexcitingupon closer inspection has
something really interestingabout it.
It could be, you know, how it'spollinated or how it grows or
its life cycle or the color ofits flowers or the diversity of
(14:27):
the different leaf shapes andsizes within the same species.
I mean, the list goes on andon, so I feel like there's just
like a ton to observe.
And dare I say plants are thelandscape, so there's a lot of
um, there's a lot to work from.
And without without plants, um,our landscape is um
non-existent, really.
Bonnie Isaac (14:46):
So without plants, life on earth would be pretty
much non-existent.
You know, we we we very muchrely on plants.
They're the basis of our foodchain.
Um, we're all wearingplant-based clothing.
We breathe oxygen, which isthanks to plants.
Our houses are made out ofplant material.
Mason Heberling (15:07):
I mean, we pretty much other organisms rely
on plants too.
Yeah.
Right.
Pretty fabulous.
So yeah.
Bonnie Isaac (15:14):
Yeah, it's I mean, it's the base.
unknown (15:16):
Yeah.
Michael Pisano (15:16):
Uh I'll take I'll take us back to that
question that I posed to Mason.
I'm curious why you personally,you know, outside of those
obvious I couldn't be alive andthis planet wouldn't be here
enough.
Mason Heberling (15:27):
Is that not a good enough for you?
Bonnie Isaac (15:29):
No, I need more.
You want more.
Okay.
Michael Pisano (15:32):
Like, why should people slow down and and you
know take the time to see thatstory that Mason's talking
about?
Why do you do it?
Bonnie Isaac (15:38):
If you really get close and look at some of the
plants, I mean, when you're justwalking by, it might look like
a green blur.
But if you really stop and getclose, you can see the intricate
details.
I mean, you can see that onthis specimen, the flowers are
not very big.
What are they like?
Maybe a you know, a quarterinch.
But when they're, you know, infull bloom, they have this
absolutely gorgeous spiral curlflower with the anthers and the
(16:02):
you know, stigma sticking out.
And there's usually a story tothat too, that the way the
flower forms is how the insectcan come in and get pollinated
and carry the pollen around.
So it's just it's just anintricate story of how things
interact.
Michael Pisano (16:17):
I bet it's super satisfying too, right?
You've you make that loop, andI think people make those uh
outside of nature very often intheir lives where you gain some
expertise, then you see thething, and you identify and you
say, Oh, I know that.
And yeah, that's a nice, that'sa special feeling.
In terms of kind of practicalsteps, I wonder how we might go
about conserving andrevitalizing populations of this
(16:39):
and other endangered plants.
Bonnie Isaac (16:41):
It's protecting the habitats and you know,
keeping the non-native thingsthat may be crowding them out,
you know, so it's going to beactive management.
I think it would be really niceif we could get some kind of
policy where native plants areprotected, because right now,
like I mentioned, the plants areowned by the landowner, so it's
(17:01):
totally on the landowner tomaintain what they have or to
protect it.
The state can only protectwhat's on state properties.
Right.
You know, so which is prettylimited.
Which is pretty limited.
Mason Heberling (17:13):
Yeah.
But that does place a biggervalue than on public lands, I
suppose, given that context.
Yeah.
Which would not be so bad.
There's something else I wantedto say, actually.
And this was um just to giveBonnie a shout out in
particular, because she's sohumble.
But I would say a big part ofthis too is just inventorying,
no knowing what's out there.
So I mean, if Bonnie didn'tcollect this specimen and have
(17:36):
this story, we wouldn't knowpotentially that that population
was there.
I like to think that's part ofour contributions, our
professional contributions tothe story is really this
baseline of what's there, when,and why.
And I think that knowledge isof course important to then
inform these some of thesehigher-level complicated
decisions.
But if we don't know that it'sthere, then kind of flying
(17:57):
blind.
Michael Pisano (17:58):
Right.
And that has been proven inland management and wildlife
management to not be thegreatest way to fly.
Um, same in a plane.
I would also say that thatdata, the baselines, are what
policymakers will end up lookingat.
They're not here in theherbarium looking at each
specimen or in the woodsthinking about those plants.
They're reading that aggregate.
And so, yeah, I reallyappreciate you bringing that up.
(18:19):
And I think if there's anythingelse you want to say, because I
know the collections are kindof you've been here working with
them for a long time.
Is there any other somethingyou want to say about uh you
know how these collectionscontribute to conservation
efforts for native plants andmaybe more broadly to bolster
environmental health?
Bonnie Isaac (18:38):
As Mason mentioned, you know, every
specimen has a story to tell.
But by looking at where theplants occurred and when they
occurred there, we can actuallytrack, you know, the
distributions of the rare plantsand the common plants and what
common plants might be gettingrarer, or what rare plants could
actually be getting more commonbased on, you know, maybe
(18:59):
environmental change or habitatmanipulation.
Because there are some plantsthat we thought were rare, but
they really like disturbance,and there's a lot of disturbance
going on now, so some of thoseare expanding.
So it's not necessarily thatbecause it was endangered, it's
always going to be endangered,because it just with habitat
manipulation, things arechanging.
The flora is dynamic, and theherbarium is basically our way
(19:21):
of documenting that.
We can document and see how theflora is changing over time and
over distance and throughoutthe world, really.
Michael Pisano (19:30):
Excellent.
And yeah, make informeddecisions about what to do to be
good neighbors to all of it.
Excellent.
I do want to move on to thisother specimen that we have
here.
Mackenzie Kimmel (19:49):
Collection item two is a small squished
snipping of a plant that easilygrows past 10 feet tall.
Often mistaken for bamboo.
Its edible shoots aresegmented, hollow, and
broad-like.
Its heart-shaped leaves arearranged alternately, meaning
(20:11):
only one grows from each node onthe stem, and they alternate
between opposite sides.
This collection item was likelytaken from a dense,
thicket-like stand, which thisspecies is known to form,
especially alongside bodies ofwater.
(20:32):
This herbarium sample includesthe plant's bright white
clusters of delicate bushyflowers, which are reminiscent
of a pointalistic painting intheir flattened form.
Can you identify collectionitem two?
Mason Heberling (20:57):
So here is kind of a slightly more tinged paper
than Bonnie's, slightly olderspecimen collected in 1920.
Some kind of medium-sizedleaves smashed to the on the
sheet with some seeds, somefruits there, and a stem, and
it's a pretty full sheet,otherwise.
Collected September 18th, 1920.
This is a knotweed specimencollected by Otto Jennings.
(21:19):
And on the handwritten label itsays Established and Forming
Thickets along Lowry's Run aboveEmsworth, Allegheny County.
unknown (21:27):
Wow.
Bonnie Isaac (21:28):
Just a curious note that it just you just said
September 18th, 1920.
Is that today?
No, it was yesterday.
This one was collectedSeptember 18th, 2020.
They were exactly a hundredyears apart.
Mason Heberling (21:40):
We actually didn't.
Bonnie Isaac (21:42):
It was totally accidental.
They were a hundred yearsapart.
Mason Heberling (21:44):
We didn't plan that.
Bonnie Isaac (21:46):
It's kind of um 100 years ago yesterday.
Michael Pisano (21:50):
Type of wonderful coincidence that could
only happen in this room.
That's very cool.
Bonnie Isaac (21:58):
Exactly a hundred years apart.
Mason Heberling (22:00):
So that's fun.
Um but yeah, so kind of this iskind of the opposite side of
the coin of um Bonnie's exampleof a species of conservation
concern.
This is kind of the opposite.
It's a non-native species alsoof conservation concern, but
because of the impact that thisspecies has on the native flora.
Michael Pisano (22:19):
And before we get into talking about its story
as an introduced species, I dowant, I'd love to hear about it
as a species.
Because I think most peoplehear knotweed, they have a
feeling, yeah, they have avision of it, but uh, you know,
living where we live here in theUnited States, we don't know
about it in its native range.
Yeah.
Can you just tell me about thisas a plant?
Mason Heberling (22:39):
Yeah, it is a species that has a long history,
I guess I would say, a longhuman history.
But the the plant kind ofspecies complex can be found in
East Asia.
So China, Korea, Japan, and theRussian Far East.
So also a temperate forestecosystem like ours, but on the
other side of the world.
A lot of people don't in thenative range don't necessarily
(23:01):
think too much about it, to behonest, which is kind of an
interesting thing consideringits commonness here and and um
not so much in its native range.
The complexities, the socialhuman complexities of
non-nativeness.
But if you didn't know ofnon-native, I mean you might
actually quite you you wouldhave a different, perhaps a
different opinion of the of theplant just seeing it, because it
(23:22):
does form very dense thickets,especially along like riparian
areas, along the rivers ofPittsburgh, for instance.
There was a vine that swallowedthe south or whatever.
I would say this might be a uman herbaceous shrubby thing that
swallowed Pittsburgh.
I don't know for sure.
Um, but it's quite quitefascinating, and it's got a
really interesting um taxonomy,biology to it.
(23:44):
Um, so in Pittsburgh, we kindof are this um, dare I say, this
haven for this incrediblemorphological and perhaps
genetic diversity of thisspecies complex.
So we have um the two parentspecies, um, giant knotweed, um,
Japanese knotweed, what we callJapanese knotweed.
Um, and then they alsohybridize, which is Bohemian
(24:06):
knotweed.
And in fact, this is has beenidentified as Bohemian knotweed,
the example I have um here infront of us.
So there's kind of like thishuge range of morphological
variation, leaf size.
So giant giant knotweed hasgiant leaves.
Japanese more kind of circular,come to a tip, and then the
then they hybridize and there'skind of variation.
(24:27):
Even within stands, there'sconsiderable variation.
But it's really quiteimpressive how how the plant
grows and spreads and how itseems to do pretty well in a lot
of different contexts.
I mean, sometimes you look at astand and you might think, oh,
what could have been here?
But in all reality, I don'tknow.
Some of the locations are whatcould have been here?
I don't know.
Not without significantrestoration because the site has
(24:50):
been kind of muddied up in avariety of ways.
It's kind of impressive thatthe plant is doing so well.
Michael Pisano (24:55):
And is uh the presence of a plant there at
maybe like a fringe of where aplant is comfortable growing in
our region, is that remediatingthat space at all for another
plant?
Or no, no, that's not reallythe case.
Mason Heberling (25:08):
No, not really.
I don't think I'd becomfortable saying that.
I don't really think so.
Um, so at one of my fieldsites, there there are like an
actually an impressive amount ofwildflowers, forest wildflowers
growing under some knotweed.
And we're studying that, but wereally think it's kind of an
ephemeral, a short-term thing,and probably um things in the in
the understory of this shrubprobably would be much happier
(25:30):
without um the competition fromthe knotweed, and probably the
long-term, long-term outcomeprobably won't be great for
those plants growing underthere, but it is kind of an
interesting, it's an interestingdynamic.
Michael Pisano (25:42):
Culturally, this word invasive has some baggage
to it.
I've heard some scientistsreally trying to get away from
the term itself.
I'd just love to hear yourthoughts on you know the
dynamics there, and for maybepeople who haven't heard that
discourse.
What how is it shifting?
How is talking about invasivesmore nuanced than it was 10
years ago?
Mason Heberling (26:00):
Yeah, for sure.
I don't know.
It's really complicated, Iguess I would say.
And it's something we're likereally exploring here.
We have a um an ongoing activeongoing project about invasive
species communication.
And that originally startedwhen we redid the um some of the
labels in the hall of botanyhere at the museum with these
fantastic dioramas of differentvegetation biomes of North
America.
(26:21):
They're really like, reallybeautifully done.
As we were writing, updatingthe labels as an invasion
biologist, somebody who studiesintroduced plants myself.
I figured, oh, we should writesomething in the labels to kind
of at least bring up this topicof non-native introduced plants.
Because actually, what was inthe label before was something
along the lines of herbsescaping a garden might become a
(26:42):
fragrant addition to thelandscape, was in there.
And I so I was like, ah, that'san that's an interesting take
on it.
But then, so then anyway, we wewrote some very short text that
actually was on Japaneseknotweed.
You know, something along thelines of, you know, Japanese
knotweed is is introduced, isnow quite common along
Pittsburgh's waterways, orsomething along those lines.
And then some others at themuseum, you know, as we're like
(27:04):
reading the labels.
This also was around the timeof um a lot of anti-immigration
sentiments in the US.
So it was kind of like, ooh, Imean, it wasn't our intent, but
we also didn't want a museumvisitor to perhaps misread that
or take it a step further, thatwe don't want Japanese people
here, for instance, or veryxenophobic or something.
(27:26):
So that kind of brought it tomy attention, I guess.
I had very much had my narrowlens on of seeing um introduced
plant, you know, all aboutnatives and all against
non-natives in terms of thiskind of binary and and thinking,
you know, even if this plantsaren't, we don't know that
they're doing bad right now,they they will eventually kind
of like kind of thing.
And so now as I think about itmore and more, I realize that
(27:48):
the language that we use aroundinvasives, which I'm I'm okay
with the term invasive, I willsay, but kind of how we talk
about it, and maybe it'simportant to put it in context
and to also kind of frame it ina way that is not that is
inclusive and not um xenophobic.
And in fact, one of the ways iswhat you did is kind of talking
about the plant as a, you know,an invasive, you know, as a
(28:09):
plant and not vilifying theplant per se, but instead
actually taking a step back andnot being like Japanese
knotweed, what a horrible plantthat's taking over, but instead
be like, you know, humans, whathave we done to bring this plant
here and to make like, youknow, the plant is not to blame.
So this kind of villainizationof the plant, I think, is is one
way around it.
And in fact, realizing thatit's not the fault of the anyone
(28:32):
from Asia, even, right?
It's um it's the fault of transof transport and this species.
We could probably talk for anhour easily about the the um the
introduction history of thisplant.
Michael Pisano (28:52):
The U.S.
Department of Agriculture'sformal definition of an invasive
species is, quote, an alienspecies whose introduction does
or is likely to cause economicor environmental harm or harm to
human health, end quote.
I wonder, by the USDA's formaldefinition, what else in the
American landscape becomesinvasive when viewed through the
(29:14):
lens of the current ecologicalcrisis?
For example, climate science isclear that industrial-scale
monocultures of non-native soy,corn, wheat, cattle, pigs, and
lawn-their crises all causeenvironmental harm.
The concept of invasiveness iscontextual, and it merits an
update if we actually want todeal with the material problems
(29:37):
posed by some neobiota.
The current approach of checkyour boots or kill it with fire
is frankly insufficient for someof the really vigorous invasive
species, like knotweed, theones with a special talent to
overwhelm, outcompete, andotherwise wreak havoc.
Which brings us to colonialism.
Invasive species.
(30:00):
Both the large-scalehuman-driven global spread of
organisms and the concept arelegacies of colonialism.
Take the post-1492 ColombianExchange.
Picture European ships bringinglivestock and seeds to remake
the new world in the image ofthe old.
What else could our landscapelook like?
(30:54):
The word invader carries itsown meaning, an implication of
malicious intent to seize andconsume and remake a foreign
image.
Exactly the colonizer's ethosthat logged the American old
growth, tried to eradicate thebuffalo, and committed genocide
against indigenous Americans tomake way for European grasses
(31:14):
and livestock and lifestyles.
Colonialism is inextricablefrom the problems and concepts
of invasive species, not tomention from natural history as
a whole.
And so solving the materialproblems with invasive species
(31:37):
must include decolonizing ourresponse.
A decolonized relationship isone of coexistence, not control.
It's collaboration betweenpeoples, disciplines, and
species towards mutual benefit.
It's creating new practicestogether in service of
collectively established goals,setting aside old ideas that no
(32:01):
longer serve us, to make roomfor what might be born next.
This is not to say that weshould just believe the
knotweed, the lanternflies, thetrees of heaven, to do what they
will unimpeded.
Rather, it's to say that ourresponse to the alien should be
based in our curiosity, notfear, and in what we can create
(32:24):
instead of what we must destroy.
Importantly, this meansgathering many voices at the
table, especially indigenousvoices, to find the right way
forward.
So please take all of this witha grain of salt.
That's just my personalcontribution to what needs to be
a collaborative conversation.
We must learn to care for thenative plants that are stressed
(32:48):
by the presence of aliencompetitors.
We cannot completely shut outneobiota.
Globalized trade isn't about togrind to a halt, so it will
continue to shuffle speciesaround.
And as the climate shifts,species ranges are shifting with
it, including the plant speciesthat we rely on for food.
We will need to accommodatethese range shifts and find ways
(33:11):
to welcome climate refugees.
This work doesn't need to waitfor permits, policy, or
approvals, nor should we expectanyone else to handle it.
Biodiversity needs investmentfrom many hands, and there's no
better time than now.
In focusing on plants and theirrich, small, interconnected
(33:31):
world, our interconnected smallhands have ability to make huge
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By electing activeparticipation, we can uncover
our potential as a greatconstructive force for good.
This is an old specimen.
(33:55):
I would have thought thatNotweed was more uh introduced
by globalization in maybe thelast 30, 40 years, but I am
wrong.
Tell me.
Mason Heberling (34:05):
Yeah, well in Pittsburgh, I mean this is so I
guess I should have said too,this is the earliest specimen.
We actually have a couplespecimens from around this year,
but it's the earliest specimenthat we have for the Pittsburgh
region.
But in North America it wasintroduced much earlier, so like
the 1860s.
But its history is definitelyvery colonial and probably
multiple points of introduction,but into the horticultural
(34:27):
trade.
So at a time when Europeans inparticular were um interested in
bringing new plants back,either for their beauty or for
human use in other ways, in morepractical ways.
But yeah, this plant wasbrought to um actually to the
Netherlands from Japan in the1800s, kind of made it into the
horticultural industry, wasactually just sent to um Q in
(34:47):
the UK, and then it was thenintroduced subsequently to the
US from the UK.
But then there also is someevidence that there's some
direct introductions too fromJapan directly to the US.
So it's quite complicated, andthere's a lot of different
genetics.
So it's said that you knowEurope is largely one maternal
clone and doesn't produce seedquite as much as in North
(35:10):
America.
Um so in some regards theyhybridize post-introduction as
well, perhaps in different waysthan they would in their native
range, too.
But in terms of like invasivesor non-natives in general, I
just think Yeah, there's a lotto it.
There's a lot of nuance abouthow we talk about it, and also
kind of on one hand, you know,being inclusive and kind of you
know being careful about how wetalk about them, but on the
(35:32):
other hand, also kind ofcommunicating the the real
environmental concern thatnon-natives do pose.
And so by invasives versusnon-natives, I could maybe give
a little definition there as youknow, non-natives is are
organisms that are don't have anevolutionary origin in the in
the region.
Right.
And then upon introduction,they may or may not be able to
(35:54):
sustain without human, withouthuman intervention in gardens,
for instance, or farms.
But sometimes they spreadeither on purpose or or
accidentally and becomenaturalized.
So these are species that asubset of these introduced
species that can formself-sustaining populations, so
they can grow in the wild andand reproduce seed or however
(36:15):
they spread.
And then a subset of those arethese, is are this kind of
invasive group, which is a muchsmaller subset.
And it's the invasive groupthat is like of most concern
because by definition, these arespecies that are actively
spreading across the landscapeand cause some sort of economic
or ecological harm.
So oftentimes we think of weedsas being, you know, a plant out
(36:38):
of place, which may or may nothave an economical, you know, it
might be a pain in your garden,or it might be an economic
problem in the farm field, whichhas huge implications.
Or like this species, forinstance, has certainly an
economic cost, but definitely anecological cost for the reasons
that we said before, you know,crowding out natives or changing
the landscape in a variety ofways.
(36:59):
Yeah.
Michael Pisano (37:00):
Which has these ripple effects through the
ecosystem, definitely.
I'm glad you brought up theword weed, I think, while we
were kind of on words, just fora second.
The word weed is included inplant names.
What do you what do you think?
Bonnie Isaac (37:13):
Well, the definition of weed is a plant
that occurs where you don't wantit.
Speaker 4 (37:17):
Yeah.
unknown (37:18):
Okay.
Bonnie Isaac (37:18):
And so and bringing it up as as part of the
common name is a whole notherissue because common names vary
from different localities.
Right.
And a lot of times the commonname for the plant has nothing
to do with what the plantactually is.
So I personally don't know thatthere are any weeds per se,
(37:39):
because I like all plants, evenif they're native, non-native,
because they're interesting.
You know, it's like, why isthat here?
How did it get here?
You know, so there are a lot ofplants in my yard that I wish
were not there.
Sure.
But I'm still like, how didthey get there?
You know, and it it fascinatesme, things like how garlic
mustard and stiltgrass, how theyspread so fast.
(38:01):
I it just it's mind-blowing tome how fast they spread.
And a lot of people considerthose weeds, and if they're a
plant that's where we don't wantthem, then by definition it is
a weed.
But having the word weed in thecommon name is that's uh kind
of a colonial thing there too.
Mason Heberling (38:17):
Right, like milkweed, for instance.
I think the whole um the Ithink there's been a changing
narrative around like milkweedin particular with monarchs and
things.
Um so I think I think the theterm weed is not quite, maybe
not quite what it was, you know,several decades ago because
maybe because of milkweed, Idon't know, or this embrace of
plants.
Michael Pisano (38:38):
Hopefully, yeah.
I think I still encounterplenty of people who hear weed
in a plant's name and say, oh,like why would I buy that?
Coming back to knotweed.
Yes.
Uh I'm curious from both ofyou.
You know, you hinted at thisidea of like being curious about
why something pops up in youryard.
Um, what do you kind of takeaway from the predicament around
(38:58):
knotweed and its presence here?
Bonnie Isaac (39:01):
That's kind of a loaded question.
Um I I really pass.
Sure.
Speaker 4 (39:10):
Mason, you've got to meditate.
Mason Heberling (39:12):
Well, I'm fascinated by it, and I'm like
shifting a lot of my researchtowards this species in
particular.
You know, it has a fascinatingbiology, a fascinating
introduction history, um, andalso it's it's an interesting
predicament.
And what do we do about theproblem of even just this one
species, for instance?
I mean, it's a species that iskind of like hard to control.
(39:32):
So that's what people ask.
Again, I don't really know thatthat much about it.
I'm not like a practitioner,um, but people will ask, you
know, how do you control it?
And it's like, well, kind ofthe latest recommendation is a
herbicide spray at a particular,I mean, there's some science
around it at a particular time.
So late season herbicide spray,no cutting.
They find if you cut it, theplant actually seems to do
(39:54):
better because it's maybe not tobetter, but it's it's
encourages its spread, which isnot what you want.
So there are there is like acareful management thereof.
But it's hard when you look atlike, I mean, acres and acres of
knotweed, and it's kind oflike, well, is the solution to
spread?
Like, what's our goal here?
Is it eradication?
Is it specific management?
I mean, I think a lot of thecommunication, I think it's a
(40:15):
great kind of poster species onthe importance of understanding
that us humans have a big impacton how plants spread and
preventing new invasions, butalso a more kind of curating,
also like doing management in avery targeted way, though.
Because I think I don't thinkthe goal is to spray all of
Pennsylvania with herbicidesonce a year continually.
(40:37):
So there is, and you know, thenof course that also brings up
some people are veryanti-spraying, some people are
are you know for it.
Like, I don't know, it bringsup all of this these things.
And in fact, this last summer,it was it was pretty, it was
pretty fun and interesting.
There's a a knotweed festivalin southwestern Pennsylvania,
and we had a table there.
It was it was really kind ofcool just to talk about the
(40:58):
species and what it what itmeans to people.
Like a lot of people also haveno idea why the festival is
called the Knotweed Festival, sothat was kind of a fun thing to
bring to it, be like, well,look, and this is when it was
introduced in the region, andda-da-da-da, and that's what it
is.
And they're like, Oh, yeah, Iknow that, I've seen that.
But also, you know, othersbring up positive things about
knotweed, like, ooh, it flowersat a time when my honeybees
(41:20):
don't have as many flowers andwe love knotweed honey.
And so it adds this like extralayer of like, you know, am I
supposed to uh, you know, likeyeah, place that in some into
some context and not um, yeah, Idon't think we should be
propagating knotweed for honeyproduction.
So yeah.
Bonnie Isaac (41:39):
I mean, it is taking over habitat of native
plants and some that areendangered, you know.
Yeah.
So it's it's discouraging someof our native plants that we're
trying to encourage.
Michael Pisano (41:52):
It's clearly here, though, and it's not
simple for it to not be here.
It's ingrained in our culture,I'm hearing.
That those aren't the reasonsto let other things fall away.
So this is clearly tricky.
You know, I think um to wrapthings up, I would like to kind
of zoom out and think around asimilar theme.
Um, envisioning a world, Iguess, in which humans have
(42:15):
worked out some better ways ofrelating to plants.
What do you see?
What's kind of a vision of uh,let's just say, a city for an
easy boundary, this city thatyou know people are getting
along better with plants,they're helping that
foundational part of the ecologyand being better neighbors to
it.
Bonnie Isaac (42:33):
Well, one of the things that we could do to be
better neighbors for plants inthat is to not give people
tickets for not mowing theiryard and encouraging native
plants so that we have nativepollinators, birds, and native
animals have passageways to getfrom one block of woods to
another, you know, so that wecan like encourage their habitat
(42:54):
to be nicer for all of us.
Michael Pisano (42:56):
Punish people for something that's probably
not, you know.
Bonnie Isaac (43:00):
No, not punish people for doing things that are
probably good for theenvironment, more than mowing
and having acres and acres ofmonoculture grass where you're
not going to have very manybirds or insects, you know.
So we just need to encouragegovernments to uh encourage
citizens to take care of theecosystem.
Michael Pisano (43:21):
Gotcha.
So in this kind of utopian,plant-friendly city, we've got
top levels of you know systemsthat say, hey, it's good for you
to do this and you disseminatethe right uh information instead
of maybe some outdated ideasabout keeping nature at bay or
out.
Right.
Wonderful.
Yes.
Mason Heberling (43:40):
What do you see in this city?
Yeah, what Bonnie said.
Um yeah, no, I mean I thinkalso just the importance of of
green space, I think, for forboth for human health but also
for plant health.
I think they're kind of one andthe same a lot of times.
And so trees are good.
Trees are good in a lot ofdifferent ways.
The importance of just havingshade is is um becoming even
(44:03):
more important.
So yeah, but that's not to sayit doesn't like come without
work, and in in today's today'sworld, I mean it comes with some
intent.
So it's not just to say, oh letlet's reduce the amount of
pavement and just let thingshappen.
Because in the case of likelike knotweed, for instance, and
and other things, um, it's kindof hard to look at concrete,
you know, parking lot area andsay, we should have all these,
(44:26):
like this this is a nativehabitat.
Like what I don't know,ultimately, like the city isn't
a quote native habitat.
Right.
It is a very different habitat.
So we can't like get upset thatwe can't plant this rare plant
that Monty has in in the parkinglot of the museum.
But I would think we there arecertain kind of urban planning
things that could be done tomake it such that we have green
(44:47):
spaces that maybe plants likelike this can flourish even in
urban settings, but also justmaximizing the amount of local
ecology that can happen in acity.
And I think through green spaceand your own lawn has an
important contribution, it'spretty surprising just planting
a couple, a couple hot plantsfor pollinators and hummingbirds
that they show up even in themiddle of the city.
(45:09):
Yeah, it really is kind of likeeach vote counts, and in this
case, it really does.
It's like doesn't take much,honestly, and then it's
addicting.
And if you've got a good thinggoing, the plant, the plants
also.
I mean, I say it's you know,you kind of have to do some
curation, but it really does thethe plants do it themselves and
they spread on their own, andlike it's a miracle.
Michael Pisano (45:29):
It's the original vegetative miracle,
right?
It's like there's something soyou know ecologically beautiful
and you know that we rely on,but it's also spiritually
extremely filling, I think, tobe surrounded by plants.
And um we really miss out.
Bonnie Isaac (45:44):
I think there have been studies done that show
that people who go outside andinteract with plants are
healthier.
unknown (45:50):
Definitely.
Michael Pisano (45:50):
Yeah, no doubt about it.
Um great.
And so just to kind of take usout, are there any people
already doing some aspects ofthat good work that you want to
plug or you know, say, hey, ifyou want to get involved in
this, you're not sure where tostart, you don't have to do it
alone.
Who should we look to?
Mason Heberling (46:06):
Support your native nurseries, I guess I
would say, and support your landtrusts, your local um parks and
and things like that.
Bonnie Isaac (46:14):
Right here in Pittsburgh, we have Tree
Pittsburgh, which will help gettrees out and about.
Mason Heberling (46:18):
And you know, in the Pittsburgh area, we also
have like Allegheny Land Trust,for instance, Audubon Society,
Western Pennsylvania has a uhnative plant center, for
instance, and they provide a lotof important information as
well.
There are resources out therethat are only increasing, and
they'll increase with with yourand with your interest, you
know.
Michael Pisano (46:39):
Excellent.
Thank you both so much forspending this time taking us
again behind the scenes of thecollection.
Appreciate you both.
unknown (46:46):
Thank you.
Bonnie Isaac (46:47):
Thank you.
Michael Pisano (46:54):
Approximately 550,000 thanks to Bonnie and
Mason for inviting us into theCarnegie's botany collection and
to the amazing plants thereinfor inspiring us to grow towards
better futures.
This whole season of We AreNature was recorded in one of
the museum's barbarian spaces,just about 15 feet away from
Mason's office.
(47:14):
Mason, many, many thanks to youand the rest of the botany crew
for your most excellenthospitality.
We are Nature is produced byNicole Heller and Sloan McRae.
It's recorded at CarnegieMuseum of Natural History by
Matt Unger and Garrett Schmidt.
DJ Thermos makes the music.
Mackenzie Kimmel describes thecollection items, and Garrett
(47:35):
Schmidt and Michael Paisano.
That's me for edit the podcast.
Thanks for listening.
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