Plant Patrol
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PLANT PATROL

For those who attended our Annual meeting on July 10, Scott William’s talk on "Invasive Plants" made us all a bit shaky. Maine is the only state west of the Continental divide that has not yet been affected with Eurasion Milfoil, a filamentous spreading plant which "takes over" once it invades a lake. Cushman Pond, on the Maine/NH border, is showing signs of it, but it’s not yet a certainty.

Alien, invasive plants with no natural enemies pose a real threat to native plants, wildlife and boaters. Take purple loosestrife, a beautiful tall spiky plant with purple flowers, which springs up in roadside ditches and marshes in July and August. It’s become a menace to New England’s wetlands, crowding out cattails and other native plants, filling in stretches of previously open water and destroying habitat and nesting areas for migratory birds and other marshland creatures. A single plant (Lythrum salicaria)can produce up to 3 million seeds in a year that can lie dormant until conditions become right for it to grow. Purple loosestrife can dry up wetlands, ruining the habitat for bird and animals by eliminating other, native plants needed for food or protection. It can dry up wetlands, ruining the habitat for bird and animals by eliminating other, native plants needed for food or protection. Other invasive plants (along with Eurasion milfoil) are water chestnut(not the edible kind) and Japanese barberry which clog waterways, tangle boat propellers and stress the fishery.

Zebra mussels, a foreign invader the size of a thumbnail, have invaded Lake Champlain in Vermont. The lake’s cold water had preserved submerged archeological treasures for centuries. Hoping to raise gunboats, such as Benedict Arnold’s from the American Revolution, marine archeologists found that the hulls were encrusted with these mussels whose cementing fibers eat away at wood and metal. Introduced into the lake in 1993 via freighters from the Black & Caspian seas, they cannot be eradicated without destroying hundreds of other lake species. The researchers must find out what’s at the bottom and document the ships before it’s too late.

 

Our only protection is prevention. Boats and motors coming from other lakes must have all fragments of weeds removed before going into the lake and all must be removed when leaving.. Eurasion milfoil can survive out of water for days; it’s extremely adaptive. A 1" long piece can start a new plant. Some lakes have established carwashes for boats near the boat landings, but these are expensive and need special septic/filtration systems. TLIA has put bright yellow "invasive lake" signs at the public boat launch and at a few right of ways to inform boaters of the necessity of removing plant fragments from boats.

Purple loosestrife can be removed by hand. It’s recommended that the flowers be cut in midsummer before seeds have formed, bagging them and throwing them away. The cut tops should not be just put on the ground because the seeds can still form and spread. Digging up the plant roots is preferable but they may be widespread and it’s difficult to get them all at one time. The best method is to keep an eye on the plants for several years and keep cutting them back.

Neighborhood patrols could solve the problem. A well-informed public can do much to prevent the spread of these invasive plants. Removing our own and helping our neighbors is the simplest method. If you see and odd plant in the lake, contact Scott Williams at 225-3035 or 336-2980.