Garlic Mustard

From Great Lakes Wiki

Garlic Mustard

Baby-boomers and twenty-something sci-fi freaks may remember the 60s cult-classic film, ‘The Day of the Triffids’, about an invasion of flesh-eating plants from outer space.

In truth, Benzie County could create its own reality show with an invasive alien species from the flora world—Garlic Mustard. The tenacious immigrant from Europe, Garlic Mustard, Alliaria petiolata, poses a serious threat to our North American woods, including some of its beloved plants such as the trillium and trout lily.

“If we like this area and wild flowers in it, something has to be done to get rid of the garlic mustard plant,” says park ranger Bill Herd of Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. “Right now, it is biggest threat to the park.”

Herd says it showed up in this region about five years ago. What makes this unique is it’s the one invasive plant that thrives in the shade of the forest floor. It is green under the snow, giving it a head start in the spring. It replaces native plants before they come up, and is even a threat to tree seedlings, threatening future forests. It’s conceivable that morel hunting will only be a story this generation tells their children of something they did before garlic mustard wiped out the northern Michigan’s favorite mushroom.

Just how concerned should we be? What is the prognosis for eliminating this plant? Herd says there are now nature preserves in several New England States that are now more than 80% garlic mustard. There are forests with no natural plants-just dense colonies of garlic mustard.

Plant biologists agree this plant could be one of the most harmful and difficult to control of all the invasive plants in the region. The seeds germinate easily. Its presence and infestation means a drastic ecological impact for native species. It changes the soil composition of the forest floor. Morels and tree-seedlings will have a hard time sprouting and growing as this plant inserts itself on the forest floor. The plant was first documented in North American around 1868. Although, it was used as a cooking herb because of its garlic-like scent, it is unclear if was deliberately or accidentally introduced by its seeds from European travelers. Now it is found in 30 U.S. states and at least three Canadian provinces. The seeds are easily spread by humans, birds, rodents and deer.

The battle is being lost to regional area infestations, including Benzie, Lake and Wexford Counties. The insidious take-over may be breeding in those back forty acres that are seldom hiked on.

Hand-pulling, herbicides and fire are the management techniques used. The simplest and most effective is hand-pulling, which could turn the losing battle around if all citizens were aware of the situation and assumed a vigilante force against this "alien flesh-eating" plant of our forest floors.

“We’re aware of this problem and we’re going to do everything we can,” says Josh Mills, Frankfort City Superintendent. “But it’s going to take a lot of community effort.” Mary Schmitt, Frankfort resident, is a perfect example of the community effort initiative that Mills was referring to. After attending a meeting at the township hall in Benzonia last month, she learned about the seriousness of the problem. She met the presenter, Jerry Solanics, who is another citizen police, who works with Manistee and Benzie counties on educating others about identification and how to participate in management. “I appointed myself ‘block captain’ Schmitt says, and I went up and down Leelanau Avenue with Jerry and knocked on doors and handed out flyers with information and photographs of the plant.” Schmitt says most people know about it but don’t know what to do about it. And, she points out that some people just aren’t physically able to get out and pull it. She says she spent an afternoon with three students from Benzie High School pulling the invader from neighbors’ yards who weren’t able. “I thanked them for taking the time to come and do this,” she said, “and one of the young men replied that it was better than staying home and watching TV.”