FEATURE
PHOTO BY KRISTIE & BRENDEN WOODS
Alien
INVADER A monster plant is taking over our wetlands, shorelines and roadsides, choking out other plants and wildlife. What is it and how can we fight it? stories by MARC HUMINILOWYCZ
T
here is an alien invasion happening in Southern Georgian Bay. Aggressive green organisms, which arrived here from afar and colonized our region along with other parts of Ontario in the last century, are spreading their seeds and growing their numbers, wreaking havoc on our communities and destroying all other life in their path. The continued efforts of a few brave souls to combat the aliens’ relentless advance, along with education to identify the invaders and keep them from running amok, are, if not eradicating the green monsters, at least keeping them contained. But the battle goes on. This alien invasion is a close encounter of the herbivorous kind, posing no direct threat to human life but menacing our natural environment and all of its inhabitants, which ultimately threatens our way of life. The alien is a grassy plant species named phragmites australis (known colloquially as invasive phragmites, European common reed, or more simply, phrag), which originated in Eurasia.
Like so many invasive species, it is difficult to say exactly how it arrived in Southern Georgian Bay, but it appears determined to stay. These aggressive plants, which grow up to 18 feet (5 metres) high in stands of up to 200 stems per square metre, are spreading like a plague in our wetlands and on our shorelines, out-competing native species for water and nutrients and releasing toxins from their roots to harm and kill surrounding vegetation. “Where you see a stand of invasive phragmites, you don’t see much else growing,” says David Sweetnam, executive director of Georgian Bay Forever, a charitable organization whose mission is to protect, enhance and restore the Georgian Bay ecosystem. Sweetnam describes stands of the invasive plants as dense and tall, virtually impenetrable to humans, and problematic for wildlife such as turtles, raccoons and even deer, which can become disoriented in their midst and die of exhaustion trying to escape. “Invasive phragmites has no natural plant-eating predators to keep it at bay, and
ABOVE: David Sweetnam, executive director of Georgian Bay Forever, cuts invasive phragmites plants near the Collingwood Arboretum. The alien reeds are invading shorelines and wetlands throughout Southern Georgian Bay, making them impassible by humans and uninhabitable by other plants and wildlife. ON THE BAY
SUMMER 2016
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