My dad is a naturalist and master gardner. His big passion that he works on all the time is ridding the nature preserves of our area (and beyond) of Garlic Mustard, an invasive plant species. Invasive species you say? Yes, plants can be invasive. Garlic Mustard came from Europe in the 1860’s and threatens plant life here. Since it’s not native to this area, deer and other animals won’t eat it, so it just grows like crazy and kills wild flowers and takes over. It’s like that rude, obnoxious guy that somebody brings to a party and you are like, “Who brought THAT guy?” Anyway, my dad is crazy passionate about getting rid of it so I knew the perfect Father’s Day gift would be to go to a nature preserve and pull some Garlic Mustard.

Here’s our Father’s Day afternoon together. You’ll notice we are in long pants and boots even though it was 90 degrees out. That would be to keep the mosquitos, ticks and poison ivy off of us. There were plenty of mosquitoes! Whew!

Pay no attention to the quality of these photos, just the people in them. 😉

Look at little Miles, walking with his hands in his pockets.

Miles quickly learned how to spot the Garlic Mustard and pull it out, roots included.

You have to snap it in half to kill it too. I had to explain that we usually never harm plants, but this was a different situation. He totally got it. I swear, he is SO much like my dad, it’s not even funny.

Here’s one of the shirts my dad wears while pulling Garlic Mustard. We made it for him a couple Father’s Days ago. My dad was even in the newspaper once for his garlic mustard pulling.

So that was our Father’s day afternoon with my dad. Thanks for going along on our hike with us.