A Group of eleven of us worked in the old car park at Dunham Massey, pulling up Balsam (Impatiens glandulifera). This invasive weed can grow to 10 foot tall! It's purply-pink helmet-shaped flowers may look pretty whilst in flower but once they turn to seed-pods these, when ripe, will open explosively dispersing up to 800 seeds a plant up to a distance of 7 metres away!! As if this wasn't enough, it's shallow root system grows in the top layer of soil or decaying leaf matter and, once the plant dies in the winter, there is nothing binding the soil so it is often washed away over the winter, causing major soil-erosion issues. This is particularly a problem when it grows on river banks. Fortunatley, as there was a large group of us today, we managed to clear a large area and, despite a bit of rain on occasion, we had a great day out 'balsam-bashing'!
No comments:
Post a Comment