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“All that glitters is not gold……….
and at Cove Spring Park/Nature Preserve, all that’s green is not necessarily keen*
*We’re talking about a really wicked weed here, the evil invasive, GARLIC MUSTARD!
Most of you are familiar with Cove Spring – you’ve probably taken a peaceful stroll through the meadow, maybe hiked up into the wooded hillsides, shared a picnic lunch or celebrated a family birthday there.
Cove Spring is a shining jewel in Frankfort’s crown; she needs all of us to help her stay that way!
Like many parks and natural areas, from the Smokey Mountains to urban backyards, 30 states at last count, Cove Spring has fallen victim to an exotic weed from Europe, Garlic Mustard.
What does Garlic Mustard do, that is so harmful? Besides crowding out less aggressive native species, including our lovely wildflowers, garlic mustard emits a chemical which basically impedes the natural fungi in the soil from helping other plants take up nutrients from the soil. Hardwood seedlings grow much slower in soil from a garlic mustard infested area than a mustard-free area.
When this plant shows up in a forest, the tree species that become the canopy are most at risk. While the effect might not be immediate, it will occur eventually; we are concerned for the future generations of forests, and of course most especially, for our own Cove Spring!
What can we do? We need to make a commitment, to eradicate this pesky weed before it eradicates our native plants. Garlic mustard has no natural predators – deer don’t eat it, unfortunately – and its biennial nature (takes two years to complete its life cycle) makes it even more difficult to destroy. We need:
•As few as 5, as many as 50 people each, from
•10 - 20 civic groups, churches, scouts, etc.
•1 day a year, late spring/early summer, for
•5 - 6 years (yeah, 5 – 6 years! But it’s only one day…)
to come out to Cove, help us PULL TOGETHER to banish this weed from Cove’s idyllic environs, and we should be able to wipe it out!
Might your group be able to help? If you’d like someone to come to one of your meetings, share more information about the problem, answer questions, Andrew Cammack, City Arborist or I would be more than happy to meet with you. We’d like to start setting up a schedule for 2009 soon, so please call me at 502-352-1333 or Cell 513-300-8500 to see if we can make this work! Thank you!
Debbie Bramlage Volunteer Coordinator
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