Red Dirt Ramblings®

Firmly rooted in the Oklahoma soil

Eradicating eastern redcedars: my garden’s journey

A few days ago, before our second windstorm and third or fourth Logan County wildfire in a week, I began eradicating eastern redcedars from my rural garden and our surrounding landscape.

The winter landscape in the back garden in 2010 shows the size of the eastern redcedar which we cut down a few days ago.

Eastern redcedars are out of control in Oklahoma.

I have never liked eastern redcedars, Juniperus virginiana, unless we’re talking about one of the named cultivars like ‘Taylor‘ or ”Canaertii.’ Even then, I would be careful where I plant any tall juniper, and I wouldn’t plant one near my home.

Rural Oklahoma is being overtaken by junipers.

In rural Oklahoma, eastern redcedars have swallowed up acres of land shoving aside other native species with abandon. They also burn like flaming torches, and suck up gallons of water that Oklahoma doesn’t have.

A new law attempts to curb the eastern redcedars’ spread.

In 2023, the Oklahoma Legislature passed House Bill 2239, creating a pilot program called the Terry Peach North Canadian Watershed Restoration Act, to eradicate redcedars and other woody invasive plants in western Oklahoma. Now, legislators are working on House Bill 2162 to broaden the prior legislation, making the pilot program permanent and expanding it to the rest of Oklahoma.

Eastern redcedars increase wildfire volatility and spread.

Wildfires have ravaged Oklahoma all week, and my county has been directly impacted. Oklahoma always has a spring fire season because of dead grasses and other plant material, but it didn’t always have such large eastern redcedars and so many. Here’s an interesting OSU Extension study.

This large eastern redcedar in the lower pasture made me miserable every spring.
Easterne redcedar stump.
The large male eastern redcedar in the lower pasture was quickly reduced to a stump.
This space really opened up after we removed the tree. The dark area is where my garden was before we downsized.
Carrying off more of the branches to the mulching machine on the street.

One of my very first blog posts, published October 31, 2007, is actually titled “The Eastern redcedar menace.” After the Simpson wildfire tore through our neighborhood in 2023, I vowed to get rid of any remaining eastern redcedars on our property. As of yesterday, I did except for one.

Two weeks ago, when Luz of Green View Lawn Care came over to help downsize my garden—which I’ll highlight in a future post—I mentioned that Bill said we could take down any of the male eastern redcedars. Luz said he’d return the following week. Yesterday, he texted me early in the morning, and I got my cell phone ready.

Green View Lawn Care truck
Trucks and men from Green View Lawn Care rolled up ready to get to work.

At nine thirty in the morning, the trucks rolled up. Men climbed out, and we walked around the property to assess which eastern redcedars were male. You can easily tell the difference in spring because male eastern redcedars are yellow with pollen. Why are these pollinators such a problem? Because junipers are wind pollinated, and they produce a lot of pollen. Cedar fever is real in Oklahoma, and I’m terribly allergic to it. Although it’s supposed to be an allergy to mountain cedars, J. ashei, I’m convinced eastern redcedars also contribute to the problem.

Female eastern redcedar my garden is named after
Our one remaining eastern redcedar. It’s the female one my garden is named after. Although she will still get pollinated by neighbors’ trees, many of these were burned up in the fire.

Bill loves the one eastern redcedar that my garden, Little Cedar Garden, is named after and since she doesn’t spew out pollen, I told him I wouldn’t cut her down. We did limb her up to keep her out of the potager garden. More sun means better vegetable growing.

This eastern redcedar was on our lot across the street. We removed it too. I thought we only removed four trees, but we actually cut down and mulched six. One was small.

Removal is one way to eradicate eastern redcedars.

The Oklahoma Conservation Commission has a good article outlining the eastern redcedar problem and ways to eradicate this invasive tree. None of the methods are cheap, but I felt like Green View was extremely reasonable.

If you can’t remove large trees, still monitor you property for seedlings and remove those along with smaller trees. That will stop the problem from growing exponentially.

In other news, I want to give a shout out to Pam Penick of Digging blog. She just celebrated her 20th blogaversary by interviewing nine long-term bloggers. I am honored to be one of the nine she spoke to. Go check out her blog post and maybe you’ll find other bloggers you want to read and garden with.

Eastern redcedars gone.
The kitchen border and back garden are looking great. I feel like I’m not behind for the first time in years.

In my 19th year of blogging, and my 36th year of gardening out here, I feel like things are truly shaping up. I can truthfully write I never expected to be blogging this long, but I’m so glad I am.

zinnia plan

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Robin Ruff Leja

    I know you said that ornamental pears are also invasive in Oklahoma, but your story of the cedar problem is so similar. In 2023, they stopped selling them here, but of course it was too late by then. It really bothers me to see small pear tree forests, when I watched them develop from seedlings to full size tree. Whoever owns that piece of land could have controlled them years ago, but didn’t, and now it would be nearly impossible. Ugh

  2. Laura

    Great post! Glad you’re okay after all the fires. Good info on eastern red cedars. I’ve wondered about their invasive nature and damage to the plains ecosystem.