reported by John
Shannon
Aided by previous
year's work, it seems feasible to have a couple of islands of
Appalachian Trail relatively free of garlic mustard, so I was pleased
to have Emerald Young and Emily Berry join me to remove garlic
mustard. At Mc Cormick Gap, we pulled and bagged garlic mustard on
the first uphill section. There seemed less than on some other areas
of trail where we have not attempted repeated clearing, but it still
took us till noon to reach the top of the first uphill section. Some
through hikers knew what we were doing, others learned a little of
the invasive plant problem. Perhaps because there were three of us,
we saw more plants than on other trips, and perhaps expanded the
clear corridor over previous years, and Emily went a little beyond
my planned stopping point, so perhaps next year we can expand the
control zone. On the way down, I found a few plants we missed earlier
amidst the other plants. Emily took away three bags of garlic mustard
so it cannot germinate and infest the trail again. Emerald suggested
that an open container would be more convenient collection container
than bags which do not stay open.
At Rockfish Gap, our
first patch of garlic mustard was right where the trail left the
road. While we thinned this out, a ranger thought we were harvesting
native plants, but was relieved to hear we were removing exotic
invasives, helping the park's mission. Then there were very few
plants close to the trail, which was not a total surprise based on
previous years, but several weeks earlier, John Brandt and I removed
a number of plants earlier in their life cycle, so it was a pleasant
surprise not to see more. However I then found a large patch which
had grown close to the trail, and Emerald started into a heavily
infested area. After lunch, I removed a handful close to where we sat
before we declared mission accomplished.
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