Permanent Plant Cover for Road Cuts and Similar Conditions by Secondary Succession

The soil material of these sites is mainly subsoil very low in fertility. To get a quick vegetative cover, heavy applications of commercial fertilizer or chicken manure, usually with added lime, are broadcast and harrowed in. Seed of either common bermudagrass or weeping lovegrass are sowed in spring or early summer while tall fescue is seeded in the fall. In either case, it is desirable to add seed of sericea lespedeza. With sprinkler irrigation and a few weeks of favorable temperature, the grasses make a dense cover. The sericea lespedeza seedlings grow slowly but survive unless completely shaded out the first summer. Without grazing or mowing, sericea lespedeza persists better than the grasses. This cover of a grass and sericea can be maintained for a long time by repeated fertilization and moderate mowing of the top growth. However, such expensive maintenance is not necessary because the original plant cover will be replaced by a secondary succession of native vegetation adapted to low soil fertility. Native poorland species of grasses, weeds, vines, shrubs, and pine seedlings will succeed the sowed species. The grasses are mainly species of Andropogon, Eragrostis, Panicum, and Leptoloma. Various Asters, Solidago’s and Eupatorium’s are the principal weeds. The vines are Rubus spp., Smilax glauca and, on the richest spots, Lonicera japonica. The principal shrubs are species of Rhus on dry sites and A1nu.r and Sallx on wet sites. Natural sowing occurs by windborne or bird-carried seed.