Letter: Ragweed’s no problem

Jeff Blesovsky of Ballito writes:

The article “New weed a serious concern” in last week’s Courier was sensationalism at its best.

Ambroisia artemisiifolia – Common Ragweed – is certainly not a new weed.

My involvement in field trials in the sugar industry since 1985 revealed Ambroisia as a common weed even back then.

A publication by South African Sugar Experiment Station in 2001, “Weeds of the South African Sugar Industry” also describes Ragweed (Pg. 31) as a “low competitor”.

This is based on the fact that it’s very easy to control.

Hay-fever can be attributed to a multitude of plants other than Ragweed.

Ambrosia is also non-toxic.

Let’s talk about serious weeds.

Parthinium histerophorus – Famine weed, Demoina weed.

This was originally found only in Mpumalanga and Swaziland until the Demoina floods in 1984.

Then it became a serious pest in Zululand and since then has spread dramatically and now occurs throughout the KZN coastal belt.

Now we are talking toxic weeds!

Any contact causes dermatitis and respiratory malfunctions in humans, dermatitis in cattle and also domestic animals. It also is responsible for bitter milk disease in livestock.

This occurs when their fodder is polluted with parthenium leaves.

The main substance is parthenin, which is dangerously toxic.

The other seriously problematic weed is pereskia aculeata – Barbados gooseberry, an extremely difficult weed to control.

It forms an impenetrable hedge with very unpleasant spines and has underground stems, making control extremely difficult.

It invades natural vegetation, smothers indigenous species and restricts access on account of its spines.

The fruit of the plant is edible and spread by birds and animals. Cuttings from the plant if left unattended will take root.

This vine is getting worse and occurs on many of the estates on the North Coast.

In my opinion it’s best to concentrate on eradicating these two weeds in particular.

The third weed of major importance is ricinus communis – Castor oil plant.

This weed is the natural host of the shot hole borer that everyone was panicking about.

It remains prolific and it appears very little has been done to control it, least of all by our municipalities.

So, we have far more serious weeds to worry about rather than the innocuous Ragweed.

Download The North Coast Courier mobile app, now available free from the Apple iStore and on Google Play, for IOS and Android phones.