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Re: Reed Canary

At 09:43 PM 6/6/98 -0600, you wrote:

>I have quite successfully eleminated most reed canary grass from a number
>of sites in our 50-acre prairie reconstruction here in central Iowa.  Two
>things are required, persistance and good plant diversity.  Around one of
>our ponds we introduced slough grass clumps, they have nearly encircled
>three sides of the pond.  Most of the water area is now occupied by river
>bulrush (Carex sp.) and round-stem bulrush.  Our pond has a very low
>nitrate level which may also help discourage reed canary.  A few clumps of
>reed canary still remain, and I try to treat them each season by wicking
>with a 30% solution of round-up.  It takes a very small amount of chemical
>to set it back for the entire season.  It asppears that regrowth is about
>20% the following year.
>
>I have also been very successful eleminating it from swales by wicking and
>having a good prairie matrix.  Rigid goldenrod, gray-headed coneflowers,
>and sawtooth sunflowers are three of the most important colonizers.  It
>appears from my observations that grasses alone, perhaps with the exception
>of slough grass and some of the larger sedges will not take out reed
>canary.

I have been trying to remove some patches of reed canary from a fairly
moist swale here in south central Wisconsin for two years.   Fire seems to
encourage, not retard, them.  I have applied roundup twice to these patches
each spring and but I still get a 40% to 50% regrowth the next year.  These
are old patches and I suspect they have built up a large seed source.  

As you say replacement is the only solution.  I don't want to use a high
caliber moist loving grass alternative though which can eventually create
an impenetrable thicket.  My hope is to get some sedges going in these
spots and then help them along by spraying the areas with Post.  This is a
grass specific herbicide that, I hope, will kill the remaining reed canary
but not the sedges.  

I'm interested in which species you mean when you say the "larger sedges"
will replace reed canary.  I'm also wondering if anyone has had success
with this approach.

James MacDonald


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