Floody Hell….
Another season of discontent for the Environment Agency!
Flooding and wrecked properties all over the news as well as tragic stories of loss of life…
Yet one of the less well known contributory factors in many of these flood disaster stories is the abundance of Japanese Knotweed on the banks of the rivers - reducing the flow capacity of the watercourse and blocking drains and overflows.
The EA have a massive task on their hands trying to manage limited budgets to gain maximum flood risk reduction. I hope I don’t offend anyone when I say that whenever I meet somebody who works for the Agency – they always appear stressed…too much to do and not enough time! (sorry guys …)
Current opinion would appear to be that the Psyllid Aphid (Alphalara itadori) (a bio control agent that the Government (under advice from CABI) will probably release in 2010) should reduce the vigour of Japanese Knotweed thus reducing its ability to spread and make it more vulnerable to chemical treatment.
However latest information from CABI suggests that :
1. the aphid will not actually kill Japanese Knotweed and
2. it will be at least a decade before the impact has any effect
Can I suggest that in conjunction with the release of the Psyllid Aphid – a more concerted effort is brought in to manage and eradicate non native species? Legislation needs to be more strict and a more coherent approach adopted by the EA. Time and again we work on projects where we are told budgets are not available – or that a three year programme is all that funding will allow (yet by the EA’s own guidelines – JK treatment takes three to five years of repeat chemical application).
Current thoughts are that legislation could be deemed unfair to some individuals. Certain landowners will have an expensive problem… whilst others will get away without any costs implication.
Isn’t that just the way things are though?
Surely one cannot, not do something - just because someone may have a financial penalty? A sensible approach to enforcement would see encouragement of chemical long term treatment to manage JK over a period of years at minimum cost.
Providing the landowner had a ‘strategy’ in place to manage his invasive plant problem, then he would not be in breach of regulations.
Common sense should prevail – then maybe we could get something done!
Mike C
