Flowering Cogongrass
Posted on 09/23/2009 8:39:11 AM PDT by Fractal Trader
The State of Alabama has just dedicated $6 million in federal stimulus money to combat a certain invasive weed, and the two men chosen to lead this ground war can already hear you laughing. Millions of dollars to kill some weeds? Sounds like another good-old-boy boondoggle. Heh-heh-heh.
But we’re not talking dandelions here. This weed is the killer weed, the nearly indestructible weed, The Weed From Another Continent — a weed that evokes those old science-fiction movies in which clueless citizens ignore reports of an alien invasion, leaving the heroes to rail in frustration:
The fools! Don’t they understand? This is cogongrass!
Two weeks ago, our two heroes began operating the Alabama Cogongrass Control Center out of the drabbest office in the drab Alabama Forestry Commission building, here in Montgomery. The small room is so spare, with its empty bookshelves and bare wood-paneled walls, that it seems to exist in black and white, save for a large, color-coded map of Alabama on a table.
Dozens of tiny green bubbles dot the map, particularly throughout the bottom third of the state. Each one represents a GPS-identified location of the enemy: cogongrass (Imperata cylindrica), also known as the Perfect Weed, and considered one of the 10 worst weeds in the world.
It can take over fields and forests, ruining crops, destroying native plants, upsetting the ecosystem. It is very difficult to kill. It burns extremely hot. And its serrated leaves and grainy composition mean that animals with even the most indiscriminate palates — goats, for example — say no thanks.
“Southwest Alabama is just solid with it,” says Ernest Lovett, the project coordinator, as he studies his map. Soon he will be dispatching advance teams across this field of engagement to spray herbicides.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
If it’s worse than Kudzu Alabama is a goner. ut can it be used for biofuel?
Mobile County has had ‘JAP Grass’ as long as I can remember. It is really, grass from hell.
I would say nuke it from orbit, but that might just make it angry.
You know, I bet mixing a good amount of sodium-chloride in the soil there would fix the problem.
{Though that might not be the most desired of solutions.}
Spray it with Windex.
It’s supposed to tolerate “high salinity” soils.
Among other diabolical features of the grass is that it is very flammable when still green, so that attempts to burn it off poses a high risk of damaging trees by the hot flames, and yet the weed itself recovers quickly from the burn.
The pH range might be its Achilles heel. It likes pH of 4 through 7.5. A severely alkaline soil would kill it. What else it would kill I don’t know.
Misreading the title, I thought this was about the “invader congress.”
I suppose that the usual things like Round-Up don’t work?
Maybe Idaho could get some “federal free money” to try to eradicate Reed Canary grass. Animals won’t eat it, it crowds out everything else, burns like a book of matches and resists herbicides.
Whatever is used, it apparently has to be applied at least twice, several months apart. That would make sense for a weed which can be burned off with fire and still return.
We have very acidic soil here...I think a pH of 4.0.
The soil is so acidic that people buried in 1850 or earlier are completely disolved along with their caskets, teeth and everything. The fact is, there's nothing left underground in all the Confederate graves here.
Pretty good article at Wikipedia. I was wondering where it came from. Apparently it’s pretty well all over at this point, but may have originated in South Asia, Africa, or Australia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperata_cylindrica
In the US, it’s found mainly in the Southeast.
“”You know, I bet mixing a good amount of sodium-chloride in the soil there would fix the problem.””
Would it work on Passion Vine/Flower and where can I get it? I don’t care if nothing EVER grew there again if I could only get rid of it.
I thought Kudzu was the worst that could happen. Here in GA, the rain we have gotten all year has just made it grow all the faster. The same must be true of the Passion Vine as I’ve never had it before.
Salt, local grocery store... though you might be interested in a 25 or 50 lb bag. (Think like restaurant-supply/bulk-item stores.)
>A severely alkaline soil would kill it.
Then mix sodium-bicarbonate {baking-soda} in the soil.
“Congressgrass” ????
eradicate all of it.
Is it Jap grass that they are speaking of?
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