Last week, we started tackling Canada Thistle and I thought we had quite a good handle on it. I had been told that last year's stewardship team had worked extensively on this invasive. Well as luck would have it I found a huge patch of it in another part of the site. We call it Canada Thistle here although it's not of Canadian origin, and it's also largely spread in other parts of the world and it's standard English name is "creeping thistle". It is considered a serious invasive species.
We also have quite a bit of Tansy that we started to dig out and pull. It can spread quickly and is actually toxic. In former centuries, people actually used to eat it or use as an herb flavouring for puddings and omelets. I can't imagine using it in food as the smell is very pungent and one can get sick of the smell, let alone eating it.
Canada Thistle and Tansy
One method of removing it is to cut it at the stem. However, we mostly tried to pull it. Some of the plants though are too big and impossible to pull so we simply cut them at the base.
Our pile of compost is growing.
The northern part of the site. There is wooded area at the back and it's a good spot to work especially in the hot weather of the last few weeks.
The pond actually looks like one now with a good water level.
Swamp Milkweed
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