Roadside Spraying Compatible With Milkweed Conservation

[Paul Cherubini]

Even compatible with milkweed restoration IF the spraying is done in late winter
or early spring before the milkweed has emerged from the ground.

Two real life examples:

1) Seeds I planted in the spring of 2011, along a roadside that had been sprayed about a month earlier, managed to produce seedlings that survived the dry summer and fall months and are now sending up healthy looking shoots again this season despite a second spraying in March this year:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7lr5Mvk_yU

2) A plug of tiny seedlings I transplanted on another section of roadside in the spring of 2011 that had been sprayed about a month earlier, also managed to survive the dry summer and fall months and are now sending up healthy looking shoots despite a second spraying in March this year:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mr7S0eLt3rE

[Mona Miller]

Wish we could believe what you are writing. You are like the boy who called wolf too many times.

Look the herbicides I am selling really don't kill plants. And, the insecticides don't really kill insects. You are like a warped, scratched record that keeps repeating and repeating. Someone please take the record off the player!

[Paul Cherubini]

Look the herbicides I am selling really don't kill plants.

1,000,000's of farmers use herbicides because they know they are useful for helping desirable plants grow stronger. Our universities advise farmers to use herbicides too:
http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/PMG/r3700311.html

[Mona Miller]

Who pays for the studies that are submitted to the EPA? Answer the chemical companies that do this research.

Just because it looks healthy does not mean it is healthy.

[Paul Cherubini]

Just because it looks healthy does not mean it is healthy.

Citizen scientists like myself can document the effects of multiple roadside herbicide treatments on the same patch of milkweed on the same piece of ground for several consecutive years if we want. Below is a spot I've been monitoring for over a year. As you can see, the milkweed isn't affected by the late winter spraying and it should develope into a big vigorous clump in bloom in July this year just like it was last year:

[Mona Miller]

But, who is going to believe this. You have lied and distorted so much information. Who is going to believe any thing that you write, photograph, or video tape?

You have your own agenda. Your agenda has to do with selling and distributing pesticides and herbicides. We really don't buy your propaganda.

[Paul Cherubini]

But, who is going to believe this

Below is a video I took today of the same exact spot of roadside milkweed shown in the four photos above. As you can see, I can zoom up very close and steadily to the the roadside milkweeds now, so everyone can see how obviously healthy they are despite the spraying back in February. There will not be many people who will refuse to believe what they are seeing with their own eyes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly3vi7-RgMw

[blazing star]

Only someone extremely illogical would herbicide seed and plugs they recently planted. Are you illogical, Paul?

[Paul Cherubini]

Only someone extremely illogical would herbicide seed and plugs they recently planted. Are you illogical, Paul?

The title of this thread should have been HIGHWAY DEPT Roadside Spraying Can Be Compatible With Milkweed Conservation (I didn't do the spraying the Highway Dept. did).

[Mona Miller]

How do we know that you don't go out there and replant after a few months and then take more pictures? We don't.

[Paul Cherubini]

How do we know that you don't go out there and replant after a few months and then take more pictures? We don't.

Everyone can see in the pictures that new weed growth (all kinds of weeds, not just milkweed) emerges from the sprayed ground.

[blazing star]

Roadside spraying is not helpful to native plant populations, including milkweed, unless the area is managed with natives in mind. Any land herbicided to get rid of all plants, only invites invasive plants to take hold. I know this as I'm actively managing a 5 acre parcel of land to native status. We're working in very small plots so that herbiciding of the invasives is manageable. So while your thread title may have some merit, it's doubtful that huge tracks of roadside spraying is compatible with milkweed conservation. Again, you use a very broad brush when making statements.

[Paul Cherubini]

Any land herbicided to get rid of all plants, only invites invasive plants to take hold. So while your thread title may have some merit, it's doubtful that huge tracks of roadside spraying is compatible with milkweed conservation. Again, you use a very broad brush when making statements.

The roadsides here in Calif are usually sprayed once a year, in late winter, before the milkweed has come up. Therefore the non-natives get killed (because they are already growing in late winter) by the spraying, but the milkweed is not. Therefore Roadside Spraying Is Compatible With Milkweed Conservation if the applications are made early in the season before the milkweed has emerged from the ground. Late Spring applications like this (that I filmed yesturday) can obviously be very harmful: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_X-pGzX6p0