The battle against invasive weeds continues.
Since forming in 2009, the North West Weed Management Area has been targeting four invasive alien weeds, leafy spurge, common tansy, yellow toadflax and scentless chamomile, considered noxious under provincial legislation.
Working with a modest budget, NWWMA manager Dave Whitehead's focus for this year is the creation of a portable display to further educate several target groups on identifying the offending plants and how to avoid spreading them. The display, being put together with the help of a $3,500 grant from SaskPower, can be set up in municipal offices or other venues WMA members decide upon. They don't have to be manned, although they could be used that way, says Whitehead, and they will include information pamphlets that can be taken away for use. The information that property owners who have noxious weeds on their property are required, legally, to do something about it will also be made clear by the display.
The groups targeted by the displays will include farmers, municipal operators, land developers and even recreational ATV riders.
Whitehead says land developers and contractors could be inadvertently spreading weeds as they create new residential or commercial subdivisions.
So can a farmer who mows a ditch for hay and doesn't avoid patches of leafy spurge that may be present. In that case, says Whitehead, something viable is going to get wrapped into a bale and taken elsewhere.
It's also crucial that municipal operators learn to identify the offending weeds. It they don't, and go through a patch on the shoulder of a road with a deck mower, seeds that may be on the ground will get sucked up and will get dropped of somewhere else.
Another way noxious weeds, particularly leafy spurge, are being spread is by the plant material getting caught up in the skid plates, shock absorbers and other parts of ATVs and transferred to another area.
Information sharing has recently been focusing on municipal operators and foremen. There are things the grader and mower operators need to know, from how to spot the alien weeds to how to clean their equipment to avoid spreading seeds or viable plant material.
This year Whitehead did a workshop with the RM of North Battleford foreman and operators.
"It was the most positive reaction I've had yet in my informational tours," he says.
Among the four WMA target weeds, leafy spurge is a particularly nasty customer. It's been in the country for 70 or 80 years, and for the last 40 years it's been considered invasive. Under the Weed Control Act, leafy spurge is also classified as a noxious weed, meaning control measures are required if it's on someone's property.
Leafy spurge is noxious to livestock and humans alike. The stems of the leafy spurge contain a milky liquid, similar to what would be found in a dandelion. If it makes contact with skin, specifically a sensitive part like the eyes or mouth, it can have a similar effect as poison ivy. Horses and cattle won't eat it, because it also causes digestive upset and can even be fatal, so a pasture infected with leafy spurge is little use to a rancher. It also has a highly competitive growing ability that can cause a drastic, irreversible shift in the ecology of surrounding habitats.
As a way to bring local governments together to fight invasive alien weeds, Saskatchewan Agriculture weed specialist Harvey Anderson, seconded to the Saskatchewan Association or Rural Municipalities, convinced the District 34 Agriculture Development and Diversification board to form a weed management area in 2009.
Whitehead says, "People like Lorne Kemp, Wilbert Fennig, Wayne Rafuse and Joe Beckman were involved in the decision." He adds, "I was hired to bring several jurisdictions to sign on."
The rural municipalities of North Battleford and Battle River, the City of North Battleford and the Town of Battleford signed on, and it was determined four weeds would be targeted.
In its first year, there was a $15,000 grant from the Native Plant Society to work with, but that was a one-time thing, says Whitehead. Since then there has been money from TransGas, SaskEnergy and SaskPower for projects, and Whitehead, a former Saskatchewan Agriculture agrologist, is paid a modest amount by the member municipalities for his part-time work.
Involvement in weed management has also led to Whitehead becoming a weed inspector for, potentially, four rural municipalities, two of which are outside the area. More municipalities hiring weed inspectors will help in the fight to control noxious weeks, says Whitehead. It will also help refine the role of the weed management area.
Saskatchewan's Noxious Weed Act states, "Every owner or occupant of land shall destroy noxious weeds on his land and prevent the spread of noxious weeds to other lands."
The reality is that in some cases it's not possible to eradicate noxious weed infestations. Control may be the only realistic option.
If you are driving along and see six plants on the side of the road, that's a situation where you can go in and "nuke" them, says Whitehead. But, if you see a few plants on the shoulder, a drift down the ditch where seeds may have been carried by water and a string of patches heading into someone's field, the reality of that case is to make best attempts to control it. In the long term, that may result in eradication, but the more short-term need is for control.
If you are a farmer, particularly if you have cattle, and you have an 80-acre patch of "bad weeds," the law may say you have to destroy it no matter the cost. But it's more realistic to say, "Let's keep the perimeter free, or keep it from going to seed," says Whitehead.
The sheer tenacity of weeds like leafy spurge is the reason eradication is not always a realistic goal. Whitehead says he'd be happy to get leafy spurge to the level where it is a background weed. With its taproot, plus lateral roots, the fact that it is a long-lived perennial and seeds can shoot, some say, up to 20 feet when bursting from their pod, it can easily become the dominant plant in a given area.
There are bio controls, such as introducing leafy spurge beetles, or intense grazing by sheep or goats.
"It comes down to a question of how big a problem it is," says Whitehead. You also have to have someone who's inspired to do it, he points out.
Using an herbicide is the most common method of control, he says.
"You have to be really careful with the herbicide approach," says Whitehead. "You should only be using an appropriate amount, and you have to look at the label of the particular herbicide. With these perennial weeds, it has been typical to use a herbicide that has a little residual property so it is taken in by the actively growing plant but the active ingredient that touches the ground persists for a few years. If you are going to do that, you have to make sure it persists pretty much where you put it."
You have to get the right product, in the right amount in the right spot, he says.
Whitehead has done his own research beyond the labels into questions such as, "What is the fate of that active ingredient and what does it do to the environment?"
"Then," he says, "there's the political aspect of 'what does it do?'"
Another question is whether to use selective or non-selective. In the case of a non-selective herbicide, "if it's green, this is going to go after it." Roundup is a common example of a non-selective herbicide.
For a small patch, less than a 10th of an acre, you might use Roundup if it was in a cultivated field, says Whitehead. It's readily available, non-residual, and the next year's crop will be unaffected.
But, he says, you wouldn't use the product he uses on leafy spurge in a cropped field. With the burden of seed on the ground of a leafy spurge patch, it has to be a residual product.
"You would be a very unhappy camper if you used that product and then planted a crop of peas there," he says.
