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> Â Dr. A. Ces Hi Fred & All, I see we have been not communicating well --- because I had not read all of the following item which you sent June 15. And I see further that the Annapolis Royal colony is considered invasive by Catling et al. And to that I say piffle. That is the P. 'communis' which I have praised and will continue to praise. And if in fact it is P. australis australis than it still merits praise. A rose by any other name will smell as sweet. It does grow very well in that Annapolis Royal marsh and water from upslope may be fairly rich. They say it spreads in ditches and I conclude that it thus lessens or prevents erosion. That is a problem ? Erosion of highway ditches is a terrible problem; killing native trout and planted trout faster than they can be planted. And no doubt a lot of insect larvae and the very streams themselves. Yt, DW, Kentville On 6/15/2020 12:08 PM, Frederick W. Schueler wrote: > Maritimers, > > Listening to the discussion of the Tantramar marshes on the Sunday > Edition yesterday, and not hearing any discussion of invasive European > Phragmites there, I'm forwarding this warning from 2004, and from 2010 > - > https://karstaddailypaintings.blogspot.com/2010/10/view-from-beausejour.html > - in the hopes that there's some possibility of action. > > from the 2010 report: "This is the one place in the Maritimes where > the invasive European Phragmites australis subspecies australis has > been reported, so we are interested in seeing how conditions here > compare to what we'd observed elsewhere in New Brunswick and Nova > Scotia... we drove the busy road across the marshes both ways, > waypointing stands and taking representative specimens... > > "The first thing we noticed was that the stands were very distinctly > divided into native-like and invasive-like kinds: we counted 11 alien > and 7 native stands, and only 1 that we called ambiguous, though the > natives graded out into little whisps, and we doubtless missed some of > these which an observer on foot could have waypointed. The most > striking feature of this difference was the persistent green foliage > of the aliens, in contrast to the shriveled get-ready-for-winter brown > of the natives (one often sees that alien plants from NW Europe retain > green leaves far longer than native plants do). > > "Those on NatureNS will remember that throughout Nova Scotia we were > perplexed by the intermediacy and confusing morphology of the majority > of the Phragmites stands we sampled there: at Tantramar there was no > ambiguity, and the natives didn't look much different from the ones we > see in Ontario". > > Those of us in Ontario have seen how completely the invasive > Phragmites can take over wide areas, and really wish action could be > taken in the Maritimes before the task becomes impossible. > > fred. > ==================================================== > > -------- Forwarded Message -------- > Subject: Catling & company on invasive Phragmites in the Maritimes (& > Nfld) > Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2004 10:39:08 -0500 > From: Frederick W. Schueler <bckcdb@istar.ca> > Organization: Bishops Mills Natural History Centre > To: NATURENB@LISTSERV.UNB.CA <NATURENB@LISTSERV.UNB.CA> > > New Brunswickers, > > I urge you to read the appended article (which has just come out in > BEN), very carefully, and to take action to suppress stands of the alien > race. All you need to do is to drive along the eastern shore of NB, and > then drive along the shore roads of New Jersey (solid alien Phragmites > as far as the eye can see), to envisage just what you don't want your > province to become. The Fundy shore is more different from New Jersey, > so the geomorphic comparison isn't so close, but solid stands of > Phragmites would be equally undesireable there. > > fred. > ------------------------------------------------------------ > ------------------------------------------------------------ > BOTANICAL ELECTRONIC NEWS No. 324, March 16, 2004 > <aceska@victoria.tc.ca> Victoria, B.C. > ----------------------------------------------------------- > Dr. A. Ceska, P.O.Box 8546, Victoria, B.C. Canada V8W 3S2 > ----------------------------------------------------------- > > STATUS OF THE ALIEN RACE OF COMMON REED (_PHRAGMITES AUSTRALIS_) > IN THE CANADIAN MARITIME PROVINCES > From: Paul M. Catling*, Gisele Mitrow*, Lynn Black*, Susan > Carbyn** > * Agriculture and AgriFood Canada, > Environmental Health, Biodiversity, > Saunders Bldg., C.E.F., Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0C6 > catlingp@agr.gc.ca > **Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada > Environmental Health, Biodiversity > 32 Main Street, Kentville, Nova Scotia B4N 1J5 > > An alien race of Common Reed (presumably the European _Phrag- > mites australis_ (Cav.) Trin. ssp. _australis_) has been rapidly > spreading along roadsides and invading and dominating wetlands > in parts of southern Ontario and Quebec since the early 1990s > (Schueler 2000a, b, Robichaud & Catling 2003, Catling et al. > 2003). The invasion and domination of native plant communities > led to a substantial reduction in native biodiversity (e.g. > Catling et al. 2003, Lavoie et al. 2003). Very recently the > status of the alien race has been clarified in other parts of > Canada (e.g. Martin 2003, Schueler et al. 2003). However, in the > Canadian maritime provinces its status has been unclear until > recently when both field study and a database of herbarium > records was completed. The herbarium records database includes > data from all major herbarium collections in Canada (including > those of particular importance with regard to the maritimes such > as ACAD, CAN, DAO, MT, MTMG, NFLD, NSPM, UNB). The value of > herbarium specimens in understanding status and spread was > increased when a method of distinguishing the races using the > floral character of lower glume length (Robichaud & Catling > 2003) made it possible to identify many herbarium specimens > lacking the distinctive lower stem characters. The alien in- > vasive race was distinguished from the native race by having > first glumes 4.1 mm long or less and lower stem internodes > yellow or browni