Martins Pond Association -- Loosestrife

North Reading Massachusetts
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Loosestrife

AMWS
Photo: Anonymous,
Center for Aquatic and Invasive Plants

Purple loosestrife:
It may be beautiful to look at, but its effects on our pond are anything but!

The Martins Pond Association is pleased to be a part of the Association of Massachusetts Wetlands Scientists' Purple Loosestrife Biomonitoring Control Project.

Helping us in this effort are members of Merrimack Professor Jon Lyon's environmental management class.

Loosestrife Harvest 2007

Loosestrife Harvest 2005

Loosestrife Project 2002


Click Image to Magnify	Click Image to Magnify

The Garucella beetles were successfully raised at Merrimack College and released into the wetlands south of the pond on Tuesday June 25th 2002.

Thanks to all of you helped out making the data quadrants a few weeks ago, it made the release a cinch.

I was just contacted by our link to the State in this, Robin Reiner of the Assoc of Mass. Wetland Scientists that we may be receiving several thousand additional bugs next week to supplement our efforts. At 10 cents a bug if we were to purchase ourselves, this is great news.

Merrimack started with about 500 adult beetles, and raised several thousand more, which are munching on the Loosestrife as we speak.

We will take pictures this year to compare with over the next few years to see how the project is working.

You will probably not see a reduction this year, as it takes about 2-3 seasons for the bugs to really multiply. Jonathan may be willing to raise them again next year for either more release, or more sites.

We will be looking for folks every 6 months to go into the wetland and collect data.