PC-RIP plans Weed Wrangle in Cloverdale Community Park Saturday

Thursday, May 20, 2021
PC-RIP Volunteer Jim Woody (right) and Sara Campfield, executive director of the Putnam County Soil & Water Conservation District and board member of PC-RIP, assess invasive species in the Cloverdale Community Park. There will be a PC-RIP Weed Wrangle in the park on Saturday from 10 a.m.-noon.
Courtesy photo

CLOVERDALE — An invading horde — an extensive family of nearly 50,000 members called “invasive species” — are growing like weeds in Putnam County and Indiana.

Saturday in Cloverdale Community Park, from 10 a.m.-noon, everyone is invited to put an “RIP” on the remains of the invaders. The group Putnam County Remove Invasive Plants (PC-RIP) is a task force of local residents dedicated to education, advocacy and action for removing invasive plants.

Amber Slaughterbeck is the regional specialist working with Putnam and 12 other counties as part of the Indiana Invasives Initiative. Recently she, Cloverdale Parks Board member Lois Bennington and Sara Campfield, executive director of the Putnam County Soil & Water Conservation District, surveyed the 5.7 acres of the Cloverdale Park several weeks ago. They found Japanese barberry, Callery pear, burning bush, Japanese honeysuckle, garlic mustard, multiflora rose, privet, purple wintercreeper, and bush honeysuckle.

“You might notice these plants for sale as you prepare to plant this spring,” Slaughterbeck said. “The PC-RIP asks that you refrain from purchasing and planting invasive species because they spread, mostly through berries.”

With this in mind, a “Weed Wrangle,” as the Indiana Invasives Initiative calls it, is set for Saturday at the park, 702 S. Lafayette St..

The RIP group hosts Weed Wrangles the fourth Saturday of every month, from 10 a.m. to noon in locales around the county. Soon enough, People Pathways may also be the site of Weed Wrangles.

Surveying the nearly 18 miles of People Pathways trails last week, Slaughterbeck said it was the longest assessment she has made in her 17-year career.

Slaughterbeck and her team conduct nearly 400 surveys annually, primarily for private landowners with properties as large as 7,000 acres but, “as far as trail systems go, we have not surveyed a system this long,” she said while covering the entire length of People Pathways in one day with Putnam Parks & Pathways Board President Allison Leer.

In Indiana, the issue prompted Gov. Eric Holcomb to declare April 18-24 as Invasive Species Awareness Week.

The Indiana Invasives Initiative provides free one-on-one technical assistance to landowners and land managers, including on-site Invasive Plant Property Surveys and Management Plans.

For your own land assessment with Slaughterbeck, visit the Southern Indiana Cooperative Invasives Management website at sicim.info.

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