Alabama Wages War Against the Perfect Weed 360
pickens writes "Dan Berry writes in the NY Times that the State of Alabama is spending millions of dollars in federal stimulus money to combat Cogongrass, a.k.a. the perfect weed, the killer weed, and the weed from another continent. A weed that 'evokes those old science-fiction movies in which clueless citizens ignore reports of an alien invasion.' Cogongrass (Imperata cylindrica) is considered one of the 10 worst weeds in the world. 'It can take over fields and forests, ruining crops, destroying native plants, upsetting the ecosystem,' writes Berry. 'It is very difficult to kill. It burns extremely hot. And its serrated leaves and grainy composition mean that animals with even the most indiscriminate palates — goats, for example — say no thanks.' Alabama's overall strategy is to draw a line across the state at Highway 80 and eradicate everything north of it; then, in phases, to try to control it to the south. But the weed is so resilient that you can't kill it with one application of herbicide, you have to return several months later and do it again. 'People think this is just a grass,' says forester Stephen Pecot. 'They don't understand that cogongrass can replace an entire ecosystem.' Left unchecked, Pecot says 'it could spread all the way to Michigan.'"
The perfect weed? (Score:5, Funny)
Here in British Columbia we don't wage war on it, it's our #1 export.
Kudzu (Score:5, Funny)
Nice.
I'll have to plant some of that inbetween the patches of kudzu.
Now I only need a face-eater and I'll finally have a respectable death-world themed garden.
Disappointed (Score:5, Funny)
Perfect crime/terrorism (Score:3, Funny)
Genetically engineer a variante of that grass that is resistant to herbicides and infest your "favorite" competitor's/enemy's fields.
Criminials and terrorists these days are all about the quick short term damages. Nobody thinks about long term, sustainable damage these days. *sigh* Amateurs!
Re:Disappointed (Score:3, Funny)
Yeah right me too! Nothing about the smokability and I RTFA!!
fuel source candidate (Score:4, Funny)
If it can be processed as fuel and ever spread to Michigan.. "Hey GM, fuel comes to you!"
Alternatively, an army of junk weed smoker could eradicate it better than goats.
Re:mutate goats to have no sense of taste (Score:5, Funny)
Having seen goats chewing happily on pieces of clothing and other garbage, mutating goats to have no sense of taste sounds to me like mutating rabbits to have long ears. (I was planning to write something slightly different but less suited for small children and Americans here.)
Combatting Congress (Score:2, Funny)
I totally read this as
"Congress, a.k.a. the perfect weed"
Re:mutate goats to have no sense of taste (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Disappointed (Score:1, Funny)
yeah about that, i think it would be cheaper to make a breed that IS smokable have them crosspolenize, and in a few years it will be gone :)
Re:Disappointed (Score:2, Funny)
Don't worry, they've been waging a decades-long war against that one too. Maybe they'll have more success against this one...
Welcome to Michigan (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Disappointed (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Turn in into advantage ! (Score:5, Funny)
I understand that there is a species of lizard that feasts on this grass. Maybe that is an option.
The amazing stuff about this is... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:The perfect weed? (Score:4, Funny)
Out here on the opposite coast, another kind of weed is flourishing.
Japanese Knotweed. The stuff grows insanely fast and spreads rhizomatically, so it's a bitch to kill.
And the really sad thing is that when it's 8 feet tall and in blossom it must look like the catch of the day for the cops, because they keep flying over to check out the encroaching patch.
Re:Disappointed (Score:5, Funny)
But therein lies the solution. Get Monsanto to genetically modify pollen from the plant to include huge quantities of THC. Release pollen into the wild. As the THC levels in the plants rise, tell the stoners that pot may be illegal but this stuff isn't even on the radar. Inform Frito-Lay to ramp up production. Then I guess I'll just stick a few ???'s in here and declare profit!
Re:Turn in into advantage ! (Score:5, Funny)
And the introduce Chinese Needle Snakes when you're overrun with lizards, yes?
And when you're overrun with Chinese Needle Snakes, introduce more Chinese fast food restaurants.
Re:Perfect crime/terrorism (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Turn in into advantage ! (Score:3, Funny)
No, you introduce gorillas. They thrive on snake meat.
Re:Sounds a lot like Kudzu (Score:3, Funny)
There must be some reason why the South of Japan is not one mass of Kudzu and cogongrass.
The reason is called "evolution". If you have it around long enough, animals will adapt to eat it. If nothing else works, they will during the first starvation period.
If you introduce it to a new ecosystem, you have to wait for a few ten-thousand years or so before that happens. Clearly, the governor is not a patient man.
Re:mutate goats to have no sense of taste (Score:5, Funny)
It's OK. It is obvious that you are a product of the public school system.
Re:Sounds a lot like Kudzu (Score:4, Funny)
There must be some reason why the South of Japan is not one mass of Kudzu and cogongrass.
There's a reason [wikipedia.org] but I don't think you're gonna like it.
Re:mutate goats to have no sense of taste (Score:3, Funny)
Who the fuck are you calling "foul mouthed", you cock-sucking sonofabitch?!
Re:Turn in into advantage ! (Score:3, Funny)
No, no, you see, that's the beautiful part. When wintertime rolls around, the gorillas simply freeze to death.
Re:The basis is sound. (Score:4, Funny)
Bugs are also bugs of the land. Does your algorithm ends with gorillas dying off in the winter?
Re:The perfect weed? (Score:5, Funny)
Hmmm... I'd better pre-order some gorillas now, before winter gets here.
Re:The basis is sound. (Score:2, Funny)
Re:The perfect weed? (Score:4, Funny)
It will eventually stop on its own... (Score:2, Funny)
'it could spread all the way to Michigan.'
But frankly it will probably stop at the Michigan border. Even this weed has its limits...
Re:The perfect weed? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The perfect weed? (Score:5, Funny)
http://magiccards.info/al/en/113.html [magiccards.info] Kudzu isn't all that hard to destroy - even http://magiccards.info/al/en/202.html [magiccards.info] will do the trick
Re:green fuel (Score:3, Funny)
of course all the energy is there, but how much do we obtain and how much do we waste? that's the question.
No, it wasn't.
You brought up carbon emissions, which is by definition 1:1 since it is neither created or destroyed in a purely chemical process.
Stop being wrong on the Internet.
Here, fixed the summary for you (Score:5, Funny)
"... the State of Alabama is spending millions of dollars in federal stimulus money to combat Congress, a.k.a. the perfect weed, the killer weed, and the weed from another continent. A weed that 'evokes those old science-fiction movies in which clueless citizens ignore reports of an alien invasion.'
Congress (Imperialista corruptivus) is considered one of the 10 worst weeds in the world. 'It can take over farms and factories, ruining cops, destroying Native Americans, upsetting the economic system,' writes Berry. 'It is very difficult to kill.' But the weed is so resilient that you can't kill it with one election, you have to return two years later and do it again. Left unchecked, Pecot says 'it could spread all the way to Europe.'"
Ah, crap! (Score:4, Funny)
It never rains but it pours :-(
Not only do we have the oil fields drying up so alternative fuels are needed to run power stations but now we have this useless, oily, hot-burning plant that grows like crazy anywhere and nobody knows how to get rid of it.
Re:The perfect weed? (Score:4, Funny)
Their lips and tongues have amazing dexterity.
This explains so much about the rumors I've heard of backwater mountain areas.
Alabama State Fighting Against Evolution (Score:4, Funny)
Isn't this just typical of the American South and Bible Belt?
Here we have a very visible proof of evolution in action (one species moving into a new area and out competing everything else), and what does the Alabama state government do? They try to eradicate that proof in a foolish attempt to show that an intelligently designed ecosystem is better, especially when it's helped by God's chosen: man.
I say to the silent majority of Americans who aren't buying into intelligent design, that you should rise up and fight this atrocity. Go out there and plant Cogongrass in your nears gardens, parks, forests and wildlife areas! Viva la Evolutión!
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