Weed Management in the Wilderness?

[BigHornRam]

I went to a meeting last night representing MT FNAWS that was put on by the Bitterroot, Clearwater, and Nez Perce Forest Service. The topic was to discuss what if anything to do to control the invasive weeds taking over large chunks of the Selway Bitterroot Wilderness. One concern of FNAWS was whether or not they were considering using domestic goats and sheep to control weeds. They are not. Herbacides, bio agents (bugs), and education were the methods discussed. From my personal experience, this area is losing a lot of winter range habitat to knapweed and should be a concern to sportsmen. Some of the more wilderness pureists in attendance voiced concern that the mans minipulation of the wilderness by managing weeds, would be worse than the effects of the weed infestations. There were lot's of good points and a variety of concerns from the people in attendance.

Any comments here on how to deal with weeds in the wilderness?

 

[JoseCuervo]

BHR,
The best way is prevention. Ban the Fat-Assed ATV riders. Require Certified Weed Free Hay for stock (or pellets) etc....

On the river trips, the FS rangers always give us cards and a weed education and ask us to pull what we see. A small effort, but every bit helps. I have seen "Roundup" crews hand spraying big hill sides for weeds in the Middle Fork corridor. On the Main, I have seen Jetboats loaded with gas pumps and 100 yard hoses spraying weeds.

We have a Natl Wildlife Refuge close that has a bug they release on thistle.

All of them have drawbacks, and all of them are struggles to keep under contol. The Goats and Sheep work well in some areas, but not where there are Wild Sheep.

 

[BigHornRam]

In the meeting they did mention that they have had good results spraying in the Frank Church wilderness. The purpose of the meeting was to get comments from the public on whether or not they should get authority to spray in the SELWAY BITTERROOT wilderness. At this point they do not have authority to do so in the Idaho portion of this wilderness (the Montana portion does have authority).

So do you or anyone else have a problem with the Forest Service spraying weeds in the Idaho potion of the Selway Bitterroot? There where some folks present that did.

 

[JoseCuervo]

It is a tough one. If you go back to the Wilderness legislation, I don't think you are allowed to use much for mechanized sprayers. Once you open the door, you will have trail crews using chain saws, and then somebody using a motorcycle to get the chain saw farther in, etc... etc... etc..

If you could assure the weeds would be wiped out, and this is a one-time effort, I would not have a problem. But if this becomes another welfare program like fighting forest fires, where the fact that we start spraying weeds requires weeds to be sprayed for ever, then it should be re-considered.

I guess I would be under the "yeah, might as well try and get it under control" school of thought...

 

[Tom]

Good question: There's no such thing as true wilderness, i.e. no intervention from man, unless man never sets foot there, ever, but then the air and water might still be a problem. If we get rid of man, which I doubt anyone would vote for, then it might go back to wilderness in a very very long time. I would vote for pulling weeds and planting some good stuff, but that's really really not wilderness then, I guess. Let me know what they decide, how the debate goes, etc.

 

[ringer]

Cabelas sells a spray rig you pull behind an ATV.

 

[MarvB]

Thanks ringer...now I've got to clean the Pepsi out of my keyboard...

 

[ELKCHSR]

But if this becomes another welfare program like fighting forest fires,

guner/sybil...

and pray tell, inform us what this means, or I am more guessing you are absolutely incapable of such things than to put empty insinuations that you can't substantiate or prove, which ever you like.

The weeds as with every thing else in this country are here to stay. The U.S. doesn't have enough money to totally eradicate them, besides, those that pay for their experiences don't usually give a rats hooey what they bring in, no matter what the cost to others.

But to the topic, some thing I posted last year that I found, there is a business in Missoula that has a bug that really goes for knapweed. The article I read didn't say much about how fast the bug would work, but it is about the only thing around that will actually eat knapweed.

These are probably our best defenses against the really bad weeds because they are so persistent and cover such a huge area that it is cost prohibitive to go after them directly, even though they have done a major good job in the Big Hole Valley with some of their noxious weeds. I don't know if they were able to nip it in the bud before it got to bad, or they had a magic wand that worked.

The problem with dousing every thing with chemicals is that they have nothing that is absolutely host specific and does get some of the beneficials while in the process, I suppose one would have to weigh the bad and some what better issues with this problem and go accordingly.

I have noticed around here and some places I was walking thru West of Missoula last week was that places the knapweed had built up the soil some over the years by adding organic material was being reclaimed by other species.

The knapweed was still their, it just wasn't such a prevalent part of the landscape it once was. Some of the places I am talking about are places I once walked through as a child (Some 35 years ago), the fields at that time to my memory were nothing but this pest, it got down your shoes and stuck in your socks.

Maybe nature is learning to come into balance in some areas with some of these little nasties, I would suppose though a lot of areas would never be able to be rid of it because of the soil conditions this stuff will thrive in when others won't...

 

[BuzzH]

Tom,

Not to bust your chops but you're wrong about "true wilderness". The definition of wilderness was never implied to leave man out of the equation...at least under the 1964 Act.

From the wilderness act: "They were to be managed "for the use and enjoyment of the American people in such manner as will leave them unimpaired for future use and enjoyment as wilderness..." No roads or structures were to be built. Vehicles and other mechanical equipment were not to be used. The minimum size was set at 5,000 acres, with certain exceptions.

The Wilderness Act of 1964 institutionalized an idea, describing a wilderness as "an area where the earth and its community of life are largely untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain."

The act is pretty clear in that allowing limited human uses is acceptable. There is no distinction in the act of "true" wilderness VS wilderness...its either wilderness or not.

Its also fair to note that exemptions were written into the wilderness act, things like taking care of insect or disease problems, trail maintainance, fire-fighting, etc. While not specifically stated in the act as an exemption, I would guess weed removal would fall under dealing with Insect and Disease problems. Thats probably why MT has gained the approval for dealing with weeds.

Also, dealing with weeds can not be a "one time shot" type of thing. Many weeds have seeds that are viable for an incredibly long period of time. I've seen places where weeds were present and then treated. For several years, you dont see them and you think you have them whipped. Then you go back and find plants growing in the areas you treated 6-7+ years later.

My theory is deal with them while you still can before you have a bad infestation that is impossible to deal with. Most all of the weed problems in wilderness areas are not that wide-spread and can be dealt with effectively by maintaining areas near trails, camp spots, etc. Its easiest and most efficient to deal with them now...rather than later.

 

[BigHornRam]

From what I gathered during the meeting, the forest service has all but thrown in the towel on the knapweed. There more focused on other weeds that are just starting to get established. Attack them before the get out of hand like the knapweed already has. There was a slide on the power point presentation of a mule driven spray rig that is currently being used in Montana and fits into the non motorized wilderness doctrine. Airial spraying from planes or helicopters will most likely not be an option and did not get any support. One of the attendees who has Bitterroot property that was once infested with knapweed claimed that with the aid of 5 different bio agents, all of the knapweed is now gone. The problem with bioagents is that they work best when the weeds are not yet out of control. Spray first to get the weeds managable and then use bio agents works best. Another concern was releasing invasive fauna to attack invasive flora may just open up another can of worms.

At any rate invasive weeds have become one of the top 4 problems on forest service land (atver's can you guess one of the other 4?). We will be dealing with this issue a lot in the years to come.

 

[ELKCHSR]

Also, dealing with weeds can not be a "one time shot" type of thing. Many weeds have seeds that are viable for an incredibly long period of time. I've seen places where weeds were present and then treated. For several years, you dont see them and you think you have them whipped. Then you go back and find plants growing in the areas you treated 6-7+ years later.

This is very true, when I was in school on this subject, the teachers would tell us that seeds can actually stay viable for well over a hundred years in the right environment.

This is why when the big forest are cut or when Mt. St Helens went off, some plants came back really quick when sunlight hits the ground...

It has been shown that Alder trees are one of these plants, staying dormant until the ground is warmed by the sun. I have seen places that were run over with a bulldozer that had not seen the light of day for close to a century after the last time some one logged the area, and the first thing to come back even before the grass did was these trees and a number of other plants.

I would venture a guess that even if all of the weeds were taken out of the environment and not seen for a lot of years, they will still pop up after all thoughts of them are long gone from peoples minds.

It is an interesting topic, that is for sure...

 

[Tom]

Buzz, thanks for the reality of wilderness. I was thinking of this paper, The Real Wilderness when I used the "true wilderness" in the post. Here's the link for the actual wilderness act too. Foreman talks about 3 definitions of wilderness in the actual act.

The Wilderness Preservation Act of 1964. http://www.leaveitwild.org/reports/wilderness1964PF.html

Dave Foreman, The real wilderness idea. http://www.wilderness.net/library/documents/science1999/Volume1/Foreman_1-5.pdf