Russian knapweed sprouting in burned areas

"The Russians are coming! The Russians are coming!"

No, not the citizens of the former Soviet Union; they're plants and they are already growing in backyards and open fields burned by the Waterfall fire. Already Russian knapweed is poking its green, finely-haired leaves through blacken patches just three weeks after the blaze. Older plants that survived the fire offer hundreds of thousands of seeds ready to take over.

And that's why Mark O'Farrell of the UNR Cooperative Extension was inspecting the fields around the house at 4092 Kings Canyon this week. He was joined by homeowner Laurie Sonderegger (who watched the flames from her rooftop go roaring up nearby J.B.'s Canyon before fleeing. Luckily, her home survived.) and local extension agent Ed Smith.

All three were worried by how quickly the Russian knapweed was moving in. The weed's green shoots were all over the burned areas. The knapweed is a perennial that grows from seeds and forms dense colonies, much like aspens, which are just one big plant.

O'Farrell, who was recently transferred to the Carson area from Douglas County after a grant from Carson City to the extension service, is charged with coordinating the battle against invasive weeds in the wake of Waterfall. He's ready to deal with problems on a one-on-one basis. (Call 782-9960 or 887-2252.)

"My job is to work with private property owners, to help them know what to do and how to do it after suffering a fire like Waterfall. Carson City and agencies will take care of city lands and public lands.

"This a perfect area for knapweed to take over," said O'Farrell. "It's adjacent to a big field of knapweed, which didn't burn. And if you look around you can see hundreds of knapweed sprouts."

Sonderegger said she had already tried using some weed killer but it hadn't been very effective. Knapweed, said O'Farrell, exudes a liquid that stops other plants from growing. Herbicides are not the best way to handle knapweed.

"I'm working here around the Waterfall fire," said O'Farrell, "because lots of homeowners are worried about revegatating their property. Luckily, we already had scheduled a Weedin' and Seeding' Workshop for Friday August 20 from 9 a.m. to noon at Lampe Park Pavilion in Gardnerville.

"We'll be going over noxious weeds and the best controls, suggesting the right species for controlling erosion control, going into important practices for successful seeding.

"We'll also be demonstrating all kinds of equipment, such as seed drillers that can be used to plant controls."

O'Farrell stressed how important it was for homeowners facing burn damage or replanting gardens or lawns to attend the workshop.

"We'll be handing out an Extension booklet, 'Invasive Weed Identification for Nevada.' It's free and is loaded with photos of plants that move into disturbed areas, such as fire sites." The public can pick up free copies of the booklet at any Extension office.

Knapweed gets around easily and the best way to battle it is to plant competitive species.

But knapweed isn't the only invader coming, so O'Farrell is ready with a guide to battling almost all of them.

Here are some revegatating tips from Ed Smith's office:

• Big sagebrush is easily killed by fire and does not resprout. Keep areas of unburned sagebrush so its windblown seeds can sprout.

• Local bitterbrush usually does not recover. The black skeletons can be removed.

• Most native shrubs resprout in a couple of years. But the locals are only about 5 percent of the plant population. Those that come back include Mormon tea, rabbitbrush, horsebrush, desert peach and wild rose.

• Perennial grasses and wildflowers usually survive a late summer fire.

• Cheatgrass, a highly flammable annual grass, probably won't be a significant factor next spring. In hot fires, like Waterfall, cheatgrass in the soil is destroyed. Next year there may be some cheatgrass but by the second year, cheatgrass may dominate a burned area.

• And remember, if native plants didn't have the potential to survive wildfires, they would've disappeared long ago.