JAPANESE KNOTWEED IS BLOOMING

JAPANESE KNOTWEED; PRETTY, BUT VERY INVASIVE

Friday,  6:30 AM.  60 degrees F at the ferry dock, 56 on the back porch.  Wind N, calm.  The sky is partly cloudy with some haze.  The humidity is 97%, the barometer 30" and steady. Yesterday was cold and foggy in the morning, changing to warmer and mostly sunny later in the day.
   Japanese knotweed, Polygonum cuspidatum, in the Buckwheat (Polygonaceae)Family, is blooming in Bayfield.  It is actually quite beautiful in bloom, and has a number of admirable characteristics, including that of holding fragile soils on steep, eroding banks, which was the reason it was introduced to Bayfield after the great flood of 1942.  Unfortunately, it is also an obnoxiously invasive plant, as unwanted here as is Kudzu in the South.
    There have been some serious attempts to eradicate it Bayfield, where it grows in almost all the local ravines, the latest being by a DNR Invasive Plant group.  Eradicating it is fine with me, as I sure don't want it in my yard, but I would like to see a program to replace it and thereby keep steep slopes stabilized, and that is not happening.
   This is another example of a government spray program for noxious weeds that has no signage and has left citizens unaware of any hazards to pets and children, and uncertain of the toxic effects on wildlife, water and fish.