Noxious Alien Weed Flourishing in South (Giant salvinia)

AP on Yahoo ^ | 7/7/05 | Michael Graczyk - AP

[Redcloak]

Will Nutrias eat the stuff? We might be able to kill two birds with one stone.

[Carry_Okie]

War, famine, disease, and... uh...

[hispanarepublicana]

Ah, floating

. That would explain why I haven't seen it up on the Llano Estacado.

[henderson field]

"...poses no known threat..."
Except that it slurps up a lot of water.
Say, Texas, just what is it that you have a sortage of?
Water?!

[freedumb2003]

Those are NOT large friendly letters ;)

But they are large(ish).

[NormsRevenge]

I don't know. Good question.

[Carry_Okie]

Say, Texas, just what is it that you have a sortage of?

I don't know but the plant might reduce surface evaporation if its transpiration rate is low.

[onyx]

Kudzu is 'branching out' --- lol.

[RightWhale]

We have vetch that some genius at DOT introduced from Pennsylvania. The stuff is thriving and drags the native vegetation down and takes the water and light for itself. They also introduced giant clover by some oversight, and that stuff is fine because it doesn't actually wrestle other vegetation to the ground.

[joesnuffy]

wonder what 800 billion weevils will end up eating after the plants are all gone..

[lowbridge]

Noxious Alien Weed Flourishing in South

[adorno]

... noxious, invasive and just plain scary. Even the species name sounds sinister: salvinia molesta.

To me it sounds like the plant version of the liberals and democrats.

[Luke]

Hummm... some ten years ago there was an attempt, in Florida's Panhandle, to grow Kudzu for a commercial market in Japan where it is still used as a tea and food additive.

Maybe this stuff could also be processed in some commercial fashion for a useful purpose. We've come a long way from the 1860s when blackeye peas were grown as fodder for race horses in Kentucky ...and today some people eat tofu.