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Connecticut Accredited Nurseryperson
Accredited Organic Land Care Professional (NOFA)
My books, movies, videos, podcasts, events ... the big collection of paul wheaton stuff!
paul wheaton wrote:
Cool! I'm a known entity in your world. I feel all celebrity-ish or notorious or something!
paul wheaton wrote:
True. Although lately I've been trying on "symbiotic". I think I like "symbiotic".
paul wheaton wrote:
I'm familiar with knapweed (and I'm tempted to start a new thread to talk about that). The alleopathy is niacin via the roots, right? (In the new thread I'll has how the bio control is going)
paul wheaton wrote:
What does the hawkweed do? I've seen patches where there is heaps of it. Yet it still seems like other plants are outcompeting it. It's leaves are so low to the ground, it seems like it just isn't gonna do well. Yet there are lots of blooms.
paul wheaton wrote:
And then I see areas where the soil is pathetic. It seems like nothing would grow there, but a few hawkweed plants are making a go of it. And in these cases, my thinking is I should throw some seed down that will improve the soil. But in the meantime, at least something is turning the dust into some kind of life.
paul wheaton wrote:
But I have yet to see a powerful infestation in a pasture or in the wild. Are there such occurrences? If so, how common is that?
paul wheaton wrote:
If the deer are eating it and getting sick, then I guess it is toxic - but is this a case where they are out of other browse, but the hawkweed has managed to still be edible?
paul wheaton wrote:
Two things:
1) how sure are you that the seeds become viable after the flower is cut? I would think that seeds might still form (unlikely) but they would not be viable.
paul wheaton wrote:
2) I think that if mary mows at 3", then the clipping of the flower stalk does only a little damage to the plant, but the real power is that the turf gets much thicker and healthier and is then better able to outcompete the hawkweed. And if there are seeds being spread, it will matter little since the seedlings won't stand a chance against the turf of awesomeness.
If you are in Missoula, my guess is to travel north toward Columbia Falls and follow the powerlines up toward Hungry Horse Dam. When I conducted a survey there, about 15 years ago, orange hawkweed was invading neighboring lawns, my guess is that it has spread throughout the powerline and into the surrounding forests by now.
Ferry County has mounted a valiant effort over the years to stop encroachment, but with pressure from the west, north and east, it may be a losing battle.
Apparently hawkweed is edible, (you can see where it’s been grazed) but our deer do not recognize it as toxic.
This has been studied, although I have nothing to cite on hand.
The Wicked Weed Cop of NE WA.
My books, movies, videos, podcasts, events ... the big collection of paul wheaton stuff!
"Here's a slide of knapweed. This is a noxious weed. Treatment is to spray it. Here's a slide of canadian thistle. This is a noxious weed. Treatment is to spray it. Here's a slide of bindweed. This is a noxious weed. Treatment is to spray it. ..." spray it, spray it, spray it, and the presentation is over. Sometimes they would have little talks about what makes the best spray.
Connecticut Accredited Nurseryperson
Accredited Organic Land Care Professional (NOFA)
helpfulgardener wrote:
Paul, kudos for a site where cognoscenti show up to post. Shows you are doing things right..
My books, movies, videos, podcasts, events ... the big collection of paul wheaton stuff!
My books, movies, videos, podcasts, events ... the big collection of paul wheaton stuff!
"the qualities of these bacteria, like the heat of the sun, electricity, or the qualities of metals, are part of the storehouse of knowledge of all men. They are manifestations of the laws of nature, free to all men and reserved exclusively to none." SCOTUS, Funk Bros. Seed Co. v. Kale Inoculant Co.
By hawkweed do you mean this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawkweed ?
If so it is a pollen allelopathy - inhibiting seed germination from what I've read online. http://www.jstor.org/pss/3988569
"Pollen allelopathy results when pollen releases toxins that inhibit seed germination, seedling emergence, sporophytic growth, or sexual reproduction. Of the six known pollen-allelopathic species, two are crops (timothy and corn and four are weeds (orange hawkweed, parthenium, yellow hawkweed, and yellow-devil hawkweed). Allelopathic pollen in weeds could pose threats to crops, especially if both are wind pollinated. Even if it is the crop that is pollen-allelopathic, other crops could be threatened, or more likely, weeds might adapt to pollen allelopathy and pose a greater problem. Nonetheless, pollen allelopathy could be a useful approach to biological control because allelochemicals are packaged in a natural targeting system (pollen grains) and are biologically active at low doses (< 10 grains/mm2 on stigmas). If it is to be an effective biological control agent, pollen allelopathy must be examined within the wider context of farming systems management and used as one method of varying selection pressures to prevent weeds from adapting to any one particular management technique or suite of techniques."
Sunflowers and other asteracea family plants are used in phytoremediation, perhaps you might find additional information under that topic? I haven't looked myself.
good luck!
Lacy
My books, movies, videos, podcasts, events ... the big collection of paul wheaton stuff!
Hi Paul,
I used to work as a research assistant to Dr. Linda Wilson at the PSES Dept. at the University of Idaho. She will know all the details of hawkweed allelopathy, so I defer to her. As I recall, the native herbivore that in Europe reduces daughter rosettes coming from the runners of the plant don't exist in the US; causing invasion, not a chemical response. There may have been an introduction of one of the natural enemies to control it - either a wasp or a midge - in recent biocontrol programs. But, I am not an expert. It does, however, have barbed hairs on the stem causing irritation of nasal tissues....may not be a great dried flower as your posts wondered!
Best regards,
Michel
*******************************************
Michel R. Wiman
Research Associate, Small Farms Program
Ctr for Sustaining Ag & Natural Resources
Washington State University TFREC
My books, movies, videos, podcasts, events ... the big collection of paul wheaton stuff!
Paul,
I am in Deary, Idaho and have had hawkweed (mostly yellow, but some orange) spreading for the last 9 years. My ground is certified Organic, so spraying is not an option. We have tried mowing, but that has to be done at very specific times to catch the flowers before they mature and it has to be done several times.
Since hawkweed propagates 3 ways (seed, runners and rhizomes), it is very invasive. It poisons the ground for the grass around it. According to the Charles Walters book Weeds - Control Without Poisons, increasing the soil pH rots the rhizomes. Increasing soil pH is complex, so we are still working on that. We have been experimenting with soil pH increase as well as planting clover (red and white) and have had sheep graze it heavily just this year. The Sheep love the flowers, so that eliminates the pollen and seeds. We don’t know how well the clover will work on hawkweed, but we have found that red clover will run out oxeye daisy, another of our noxious weeds.
I don’t know if this is helpful, but hawkweed very definitely fits the definition of weed (changes its environment to suit itself, grows thickly and chokes out more desirable plants.
Daryl Swanstrom,
Tourmaline Farms
My books, movies, videos, podcasts, events ... the big collection of paul wheaton stuff!
My uncle always said, "Raising beds is better than wetting them".
Ask me about food.
How Permies.com Works (lots of useful links)
Ask me about food.
How Permies.com Works (lots of useful links)
Ask me about food.
How Permies.com Works (lots of useful links)
Ask me about food.
How Permies.com Works (lots of useful links)
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formerly employed as a constant medicine in diseases of the lungs, asthma and incipient consumption, but the small Mouse-ear Hawkweed, known commonly as Mouse-ear is still collected and used by herbalists for its medicinal properties.
Invasive plants are Earth's way of insisting we notice her medicines. Stephen Herrod Buhner
Everyone learns what works by learning what doesn't work. Stephen Herrod Buhner
Anne Miller wrote:I thought it looked like false dandelion so I looked up hawkweed. They do look similar.
Blog: 5 Acres & A Dream
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H. radicata is a herbaceous perennial originally native to Morocco. It is a very successful colonizing species that is now present on all continents except Antarctica (Ortiz et al., 2008). In New Zealand, Healy (1992) described the distribution of the introduced H. radicata as ‘one of, if not the most widely distributed introduced weeds on a geographical and altitudinal basis.’ It is considered one of the most invasive alien plants on the island of La Reunion (ISSG, 2013). H. radicata readily invades freshly disturbed environments, such as Mount St. Helens following its 1980 eruption (Schoenfelder et al., 2010), and can crowd out more palatable and productive forage species when it invades overgrazed pasture and rangeland (DiTomaso et al., 2013). PIER (2014) indicated it is invasive in a wide range of territories and islands around the Pacific.
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paul wheaton wrote:I can understand concern about some weeds, like leafy spurge or knapweed (which poisons the plants around it) or canadian thistle or bindweed. These are so invasive that once they get started, they can be really hard to find something to outcompete them. They can dominate an area pretty thoroughly.
I've only seen yellow hawkweed and orange hawkweed.
I guess I don't understand the panic. Will hawkweed dominate an area? The plant seems so tiny and low to the ground. It seems to like only the poorest soils, so it seems like a great indicator of where there are poor soils.
Is it toxic in some way?
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