INVASIVE
SPECIES
You
may have heard reports of
our sustained drought conditions that are continuing to affect the
Southwest,
and the mountain is not immune to the warming trend.
While we continue to enjoy our sky island
retreat, we need to take precautions to ensure its recovery and protect
it from
further fire threats. A
new threat that
has been identified is cheat- grass, Bromus
tectorum. Cheatgrass
is a highly
flammable grass that has been found on the mountain in the last couple
of years
and is of concern because it would significantly compromise our ability
to keep
fires under control in Summerhaven.
In Utah,
cheatgrass has
extended the fire season. It
creates an
extensive seedbed that can survive fire and repopulate quickly before
native
plants can become re-established. Because of its short life cycle,
cheatgrass
becomes dry fuel for fires by early summer, making many areas easy
targets for
hotter, faster-moving fires that burn with greater intensity. Because this grass is just
getting a foothold
on the mountain, it should be fairly easy to eradicate if we act now.
Trees
for Mt. Lemmon,
with a grant from the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension’s
Forest
Health program (http://cals.arizona.edu/extension/fh/),
has conducted surveys of the areas affected and has begun to treat
affected areas as of spring of 2007.
Download report (
pdf)
2010 - The
first cheatgrass was found and reported by Dennis Cozzetti on May 18th.
In areas where peopel are pulling, it is much reduced. For
those areas where people are not actively pulling and/or spraying, it
is worse than ever.
As of Saturday, June 13th, most of it
is still green. Please spray if you can since that minimizes soil
disturbance and limits both erosion and further cheatgrass infestation.
If it is purple, please bag it carefully so as not to spread the
seed.
CHEATGRASS
EDUCATION AND ERADICATION
The
Ecological
Restoration Institute at NAU has just published a
very good overview cheatgrass and the reasons why we are so concerned
about
it on the mountain. To view the pdf file of this publication (click here)
Download information sheet
on cheatgrass (
pdf)
Cheatgrass - Bromus
tectorum
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Characteristics of
cheatgrass:
- 6 –
12” high
- “Nodding”
seed head (bends over)
- Mostly
stems and seeds, few leaves
- Turns
purple when mature
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Remember when
eradicating:
- Spray
with chemicals only when green.
- Pull
before the seeds dry and disperse.
- Pull
gently; the plants usually come out easily.
- Immediately
put plants in plastic bag and seal
before disposal.
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