I went to a series of gardening talks the other weekend. There was a biosecurity officer from the council talking about tackling pest plants. He recommended that block owners develop a weedbusting plan rather than attempting to attack all the weeds at once. One option is to focus on just one or two types of pest plants.
We've already made a significant impact on the convolvulus - the most pernicious weed that we have. We started attacking privet last year and now it's the turn of the wattle.
This wattle had grown up since we moved in four years ago and had started to obscure our view. When the wattles flowered a few months ago, we could see quite how many there are around the neighbourhood and the more that we have, the more we will get as the seeds spread.
When J cut back the lower branches in order to fell the tree, I was amazed to see how thick the lower trunk was - surely that wasn't just four years of growth? J found older cuts at the base though - it had obviously been cut back before and had re-grown. The tree is now waiting for the next bonfire and we'll have to get some weedkiller to poison the stump so that it doesn't revive itself.
.JPG)
