We have some vines, mainly crawling on our fences, but also Concord grapes growing on an arbor in our edible garden. Trumpet honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens) is my favorite.
IMPORTANT: This is the NATIVE version, not the non-native invasive honeysuckle vine commonly sold.
Here are the vines we grow:
- Aristolochia macrophylla – Dutchman’s pipeline NOT QUITE NATIVE
- Campsis radicans – Trumpet vine NOT QUITE NATIVE
- Clematis virginiana – Virgin’s bower
- Lonicera hirsuta – Hairy honeysuckle
- Lonicera sempervirens – Trumpet honeysuckle
- Parthenocissus quinquefolia – Virginia creeper
Here are the vines we grow in our habitat garden
Resources
- A Way to Garden.com:
- Get smarter about poison ivy, with Dr. Susan Pell – Poison ivy is a native vine beneficial to wildlife, but difficult for people to have in their yard
- Rodale’s Organic Life:
Reflections
Today, humans have inverted the spatial design of forests. Whereas most forests used to be continuous woods with closed canopies, now most of the land is cleared of trees and our forest patches are so small that they are nearly all edge habitats ideal for vine growth. … The solution, of course, is for us to manage vine growth. To give the trees a chance, we must rip out every oriental bittersweet we see — is my passion showing? — and reduce the number of grapevines on our properties.
~ Douglas Tallamy, Bringing Nature Home, p. 278