Re: State Receives $ to Fight Milfoil Infestations

[Amy Smagula]

Mechanical harvesting is not the answer to the milfoil problem in New Hampshire. The plant spreads primarily through fragmentation, and as such, harvesting (or literally chopping) the plant into small pieces will only cause the problem to become worse. Each fragment that is created has the potential to grow roots, settle, and cause new plants to grow. Besides, the plants are still alive below the point where they are cut, and the roots are still intact, so the plants will continue to grow.

[madrasahs]

.
"The plant spreads primarily through fragmentation, and as such, harvesting (or literally chopping) the plant into small pieces will only cause the problem to become worse."

On any one temperate day on Winnipesaukee, there are thousands of long, floating, variable milfoil fragments -- many broken or loosened by the "wave action" of oversize-boat wakes.

It is spreading at an accelerating pace -- nourished by:
1) the organic detritus milfoil leaves behind naturally,
2) the phosphorus milfoil creates by itself,
3) nitrogen introduced by humans into the Winnipesaukee Basin,
4) the human-metabolized phosphorus that leaches into the lake.

Collecting milfoil mechanically could rid two lake curses -- milfoil and phosphorus -- simultaneously. (It is expected to return eventually).

Is a mechanical collector a more effective fragmenter of milfoil than the hundreds of Winnipesaukee's Jet-Skis?

I'll take mechanical harvesting over the effects that chemicals can have on those who rely on the relative purity of Winnipesaukee's waters. Wouldn't Maine be derelict, then, in their use of mechanical collecting?

[GWC...]

Reminds me of shaving.

Too bad it does not work on the top of my head...