{"id":1312,"date":"2014-05-06T15:58:27","date_gmt":"2014-05-06T15:58:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/?p=1312"},"modified":"2016-10-13T21:02:56","modified_gmt":"2016-10-13T21:02:56","slug":"weeding-out-invasive-plants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/en\/weeding-out-invasive-plants\/","title":{"rendered":"Weeding out Invasive Plants"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Garlic<\/a>
Garlic mustard leaves, found growing this week<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Here in eastern Canada,\u00a0spring plants like mayapple and trilliums are beginning to\u00a0leaf out\u00a0while others, like bloodroot and hepatica,\u00a0are blooming. The treetops are still bare as is much of the ground. But already patches of garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata<\/em>) are greening up the woodland floor here at CWF’s Wildlife-friendly Demonstration Garden<\/a>. We spotted\u00a0this highly invasive plant\u00a0a few years ago and have reduced the patches significantly…but evidently there are a few more to pull!<\/p>\n

Garlic mustard is one of the top forest invaders in\u00a0Canada. It was brought over by the Europeans as a nutritious food that\u00a0can be steamed, blanched, boiled or eaten raw in salads.\u00a0But its aggressive nature has caused it to spread fast,\u00a0crowding out native plants such as trilliums and spring beauty. It is also thought to destroy fungi in the soil, affecting a multitude of forest plants including trees. Animals are in turn affected, such as some native butterflies whose larval food plant (the plant they lay their eggs on which feed caterpillars) are being displaced.<\/p>\n

Check out the photos below, mostly taken last summer, to help you recognize it at different stages.\u00a0It is a biennial (two year plant) so growth is small the first year. The second year growth is tall, up to a meter, and is the stage that flowers and produces seeds.<\/p>\n

If you find it on\u00a0your property it’s best to pull it out soon, before flowers (and especially\u00a0seeds) form, to minimize it spreading further. It is one of the easiest invasive plants to pull up but it also helps to pull it out after the spring rain has moistened the ground.\u00a0Put plants in a sealed dark garbage bag and dispose in the garbage. If you are at all curious about its edibility, please do your research before adding it (or any other wild plant)\u00a0to your dinner plate.<\/p>\n

Also be careful not to leave plants behind as they can continue to produce seeds, even after being pulled! If you find it in public areas, let your municipality know so they can take measures to remove it. Perhaps you\u00a0could even organize a clean up with neighbours! It is also prudent to check the area over subsequent years, as seeds in the soil can remain viable (able to germinate into a plant) for a long time.<\/p>\n

For more information on invasive species, visit our Invasive Species Encyclopedia <\/a>or this article<\/a> on why some non-native invasive plants can be a serious problem to our wild spaces and the plants and animals within them.<\/p>\n

\"garlic<\/a>
garlic mustard’s new growth as of this week showing a little more reddish-brown than the image at the top<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"garlic<\/a>
garlic mustard – second year growth<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"garlic<\/a>
garlic mustard – this angle shows the fuzzy stems<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"garlic<\/a>
garlic mustard soon takes over an area<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"garlic<\/a>
garlic mustard flowers – note the small 4-petaled white flowers<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"garlic<\/a>
garlic mustard – upper leaves are more pointy and triangular than lower leaves<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

[PHOTOS: CWF]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here in eastern Canada,\u00a0spring plants like mayapple and trilliums are beginning to\u00a0leaf out\u00a0while others, like bloodroot and hepatica,\u00a0are blooming. The treetops are still bare as is much of the ground.…<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[631,641],"tags":[352,529,702,178],"class_list":["post-1312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-connect-with-nature","category-gardening","tag-cwf-demonstration-garden","tag-garlic-mustard","tag-invasive-plants","tag-invasive-species"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1312"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1312\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1348,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1312\/revisions\/1348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cwf-fcf.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}