mcdude
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MILFOIL FIGHT AHEAD OF SCHEDULE
Barnstead's milfoil fight is ahead of schedule, money may be saved
by Brendan Berube
Contributing Writer
The Baysider
January 18, 2007
BARNSTEAD — Milfoil's days as the Terror of Barnstead's Waterways are numbered – and the threat might be over sooner than anyone expected.
The successful drawdown and treatment of the Suncook River in the fall of 2006 has allowed the Milfoil Committee to shave a year off what was originally a four-year plan to remove the invasive plant from the Suncook watershed.
Chairman Ed Neister explained at the committee's Jan. 11 meeting that the town agreed to give the committee $40,000 over four years toward the removal project.
With the project ahead of schedule by a year, he said, the town will only have to pay $30,000.
Under the revised plan, the committee plans to treat the rest of the Suncook River with the herbicide 2,4-D (2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic Acid) in April and May. According to Neister, 2,4-D acts as a growth hormone, causing the milfoil plant to increase in size so rapidly that its cells break down. A thorough treatment with 2, 4-D combined with a vigilant monitoring program should, he said, eliminate the need for future treatment.
The Locke Lake Colony Association will treat its own milfoil problem this year, as well, with the committee agreeing to monitor Locke Lake, and send divers in to pull any surviving plants.
"You have to have people constantly looking for milfoil, or it will sneak back in," said Neister, explaining that the committee will also keep a close eye on the Suncook.
Boats, which carry milfoil from one body of water to the next on their hulls, are a major source of the infestation, Neister said, but not the only one.
Neister discovered over the summer that milfoil also clings to the feet of ducks and geese, who carry it wherever they go.
"We need to figure out how we can break the chain [of contamination]," he said.
"Education is the key," said Pam Miller, the committee's survey specialist.
People need to be made aware of what milfoil looks like, Miller said, and what it can do, because the people who use the river are the first line of defense.
Army interest
The Army Corps of Engineers (A.C.O.E.), whose exotic plant removal division has run into problems of its own dealing with milfoil, has taken a keen interest in the committee's plan.
According to Neister, representatives from the A.C.O.E. came to Barnstead to observe the test treatment of the Suncook, and were so impressed by what they saw that they offered to assist Neister's group both financially, and as an oversight committee.
If this spring's full-on treatment of the river proves successful, Neister said, the A.C.O.E. may implement the committee's plan of attack nationwide, placing Barnstead on the cutting edge of the fight against milfoil.
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1/20/2007, 1:47 pm
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The Knife
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Re: MILFOIL FIGHT AHEAD OF SCHEDULE
quote:
mcdude wrote:
Neister discovered over the summer that milfoil also clings to the feet of ducks and geese, who carry it wherever they go.
Wow, I'd not heard of this before. Time to get the 12 ga out ?
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Real men use 1911 not 911 ! - Mac the Knife
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1/24/2007, 12:40 am
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