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UKs ANSWER TO THE AUSSIE CANE TOAD

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AGILIS View Drop Down
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    Posted: 13 Oct 2008 at 3:18am
Well what do you all think of the import of the new bug to contain the Japanese knot weed (  bugs name is afalara isadora) not sure thats the right spelling as only heard the name on the radio 2day, is this going to be our , answer to the Australian cane toad , when its finished eating all the weed up whats it going to feed on next ,in a thousand years time? lolkeith



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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote AGILIS Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Oct 2008 at 2:44am
WELL this beetle will also be part of the future food chain for reptiles amphibs birds etc ,will there be any toxic side affects in the long run ? and has there been a testing out on its impact by the people involved in getting it introduced ,  the cane toad is toxic and will kill many of the species that will devour it like large snakes and goanas and birds that is the major worry in Australia, not because of its numbers  . Also I am sure human resourses here in the UK can eliminate this weed quicker than a load of beetles by clearing by hand and burning as we have an abundance of idle labour in this country doing nothing or is that to non  pckeith

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote tim hamlett Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Oct 2008 at 7:59am

i have it in my garden.  i daren't try to dig it out in case i make it worse by spreading tiny bits of root around. for the past 7 years i have picked every shoot i see before it gets to more than a couple of inches high. it hasn't spread but neither has it died. not much else i can do really!

tim

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote AGILIS Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Oct 2008 at 11:50am
HI all my actual question was about the impact of the beetle being introduced will this in the future  become the pest? keith
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Mark_b Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Oct 2008 at 11:59am

http://www.arlis.org/docs/vol1/166276164.pdf#page=35

There is the research paper that the news article is all about, havent had change to read it yet

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Chris Monk Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Oct 2008 at 4:49pm
CABI have been researching a biological control for Japanese knotweed for several years now and many promising controls (insects, virus or fungal vectors that control it in Japan) have had to be abandoned as they have a deleterious effect on various plants that are common across the UK. This has had a long term testing programme running to check it out not a random guess that it might work like the import of cane toads to Australia (where it didn't even eat the pest it was introduced to control and ate everything else instead) or the past introduction of species to "complement" the British flora and fauna like grey squirrels, mink or signal crayfish.
Even if this one works as well as the news reports are saying there will still be a licensing proceedure before it would become available. They  already have a breeding programme to produce enough of the weevils that eat through another pest plant of ponds & waterways - Azolla. If the European horticulturists who imported this plant from Japan in the eighteenth century and distributed it, initially via botanical gardens like Kew, hadn't been so particular about obtaining a perfect specimen they would have brought some of its natural pests with it, without any checking on what effect they might have.

PS Don't forget that all that Japanese knotweed infesting the UK is a vegetative clone of just one plant. I've been organising the spraying with recommended herbicides on some of my sites at work for 7 years and its still coming up every year.


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Chris

Derbyshire Amphibian & Reptile Group

www.derbyshirearg.co.uk

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tim hamlett View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote tim hamlett Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 2008 at 2:14pm

thanks caleb.

i have always been reluctant to use weedkillers containing glysophates in the past as other plants in the garden like bamboos keel over and die at the slightest whiff of them. even painting it onto the leaves had it's drawbacks, i.e. having to wait until the plants were about to come into flower, repeating the procedure over several years and the continued, if reduced, risk of contaminating other plants. however, this method looks like it may well be worth a go.

cheers

tim 

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AGILIS View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote AGILIS Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 2008 at 2:53pm
thats the trouble the cure can end up worse then the original problem then trying to find a cure for the cure add infinitumkeith
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