this post was submitted on 09 Nov 2023
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Science Memes

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JAPANESE KNOTWEED (mander.xyz)
submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 36 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Try doing that in Iceland. They’re both very aware and conflicted about invasive species up there. Lupin is invasive and covering the country and also building soil from nothing, Pine trees are invasive and the quickest way to get treecover that is desperately needed.

Makes for weird discussions, I guess Iceland is such and extreme case that nobody really knows if they should be saving the ecosystem it had managed to scratch together before we turned up or if they should be trying to rush a healthier ecosystem with imports (Iceland was pretty thin and fragile even before humans and we wrecked what little there was)

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (1 children)

In California, we have Tumbleweed, and it's actually really useful for stabilizing/fertilizing loose, disturbed soils and making shelter for native grasses and plants to start growing near. They also love to fuck with cars by jumping out in front of them at every opportunity.

[–] not_that_guy05 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

In California they are a danger to the environment. They can spread fires quicker and spread it to different areas. No bueno.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (2 children)

The California Invasive Plant Council found that Tumbleweeds had no meaningful impact on wildfire risk one way or the other.

[–] mrbaby 8 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Of course a council full of invasive plants would say that

[–] not_that_guy05 2 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Link?

[–] WhiskyTangoFoxtrot 6 points 10 months ago

While waving a flaming Deku stick around probably isn't safe I don't think you can blame California's wildfires on a pointy-eared kid with a floppy hat.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] not_that_guy05 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

My friend your paper states

Plants may add oxalate leachate to soil, making phosphorous more available and facilitating colonization. Can increase fire hazard, especially along tree rows and fences when dead plants build up.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Direct quote from the same item:

Increases fire hazard (though may be a hazard primarily to human landscapes).

In other words, it doesn't meaningfully contribute to the overall ecological fire hazard, you're mostly talking highway veg fires and stuff, which happen with or without tumbleweeds.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Are there many species there that are specific to Iceland which would be harmed by lupines and pines taking over?

If it's most an amalgamation of stuff that commonly found elsewhere I think it would be fine.

If pine seeds came to Iceland on the wind 100 years before humans got there it would have been considered native. Most the seeds of all the other stuff got there the same way I imagine, unless they've been isolated since the island split from a continent somewhere.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Well there’s the native birch forests, which get outcompeted. But given the vikings killed them off it’s mostly just the opportunity cost of planting pine over birch. There was a bit of both, so it’s not all or nothing of course