Disturbed vs. Undisturbed Nature!

[NoGenAI]

And sometimes native species can act invasively given right circumstances. We have that problem in our forest; there is no midstory because the former owner had horses & cattle, and even bushogged the forest floor so it looked all nice and open (we found photos from the 1990’s in the workshop showing it!). In his old age he started letting it go, so now there are about 10 yr of growth at oldest. But no midstory whatsoever. Muscadine vine is an issue, it covers the ground in some areas, choking out saplings and covering the young 2-5 year trees in a very kudzu-like fashion. We are trying to fight it back, cut it off the young trees, etc. In the little plots (10x10, etc) we got rid of it last summer, there are oak and hickory saplings this year. We will keep fighting it off until we get a healthier forest floor and a good midstory - as right now in a few areas it is literally preventing the forest from recovering. It isn’t every where in the forest luckily, but the patches it is, it’s litterally acting like kudzu to the young trees.