Tag: weeding

Fighting the Invaders in The Mini Wildscape

Sue Ann (Suna) Kendall1 Comment

By Carolyn Henderson

A small but intrepid group took on the fight of the non-native, invasive plants in the Wildscape – again. Chad Cryer, Alan Rudd, Liz Lewis, Phyllis Sheffield, Pamela Neeley and I implemented a new method to attempt to get rid of the seriously invasive persimmons and Tree of Heavens. 

Small but mighty

I would call it isolated poisoning. Chad clipped the multitude of pomegranate trees, many that had managed to reach at least 5 to 6 feet this season. Alan then put a tree poison only on the cut limbs.  We cut them back in February. Alan had already done it to the Tree of Heavens that weren’t as numerous. 

The invasives elimination committee.

We put all the limbs in Alan’s pickup bed. The pile stood taller than the truck cab. 

We also fought off the Tievine that had totally covered the Gulf Muhly grass among other things. We also removed the other invasives in the Wildscape. A good deal of what had been planted was there, but scraggly looking from being overshadowed by all of those. It knocked out a few completely. 

The weeding committee

We vowed to be back in two weeks to evaluate our efforts. 

Native Texas Flower Bed Improving

Sue Ann (Suna) KendallLeave a comment

By Carolyn Henderson

Progress is being made on the flower bed the chapter voted to develop into a native Texas plot. If faces Travis Street, so those of us who are in downtown Cameron regularly have paid attention to the ongoing battle with the non-planted plants running rampant in it. 

The bed after weeding

Some might call them weeds. But, some of them are native wild flowers that tend to be invasive – in that they overrun everything else around them. For example, Persimmons are coming up repetitively all over that bed, and they are very hard to get up.

Luckily, almost everything we planted has survived and is growing. We plan to plant more things in the  fall with the hopes of all of ours overrunning all he uninvited plants. We could put poison on the interlopers, but we don’t want to risk what we did plant. Mulch is on order to be put down this week.

The photos are from work done today. Jackie Thornton and Liz Lewis, both regulars at the plot, as well as Connie Anderle and Linda Jo Conn did a lot of work on the bed today. We also had an unexpected volunteer – Ed Guerrero – who is a master weed puller. I’m pretty sure we would not have gotten the whole thing done without him.

The weed pullers

Past contributors to the project have been Catherine Johnson, Phyllis Shuffield, and Pamela Neeley. If you can pull a weed, you can volunteer. When we are done, we all go have lunch to celebrate winning this battle against those unwanted invaders.