Death, Clint, and Astragalus mollissimus
While I'm stalking the lethal Astragalus mollissimus ( locoweed ) in my horse pasture, I often end up playing cowboy. I growl my best Clint Eastwood and blast the offending weed with a lethal dose of non-earth friendly poison.
"Tomorrow is promised to no one, you bastards,"
It goes against my nature, poisoning things, so it's easy to pretend I'm a lone outlaw, regretfully creating mayhem and murder in order to protect the youngun's back home. The upright citizen in me tries to control weeds with mowing and rotational grazing, but that frigging locoweed can kill my horses and goats, and I've declared war. War calls for extreme measures, in my case,
I think about the morality of poisoning a natural, Colorado native plant. If I take it out of the cycle, what is the replacement going to be? When I poison it, what will grow in it's place? Everything has a reason, although the point of this fast spreading weed with beautiful purple flowers is beyond me. It takes over huge chunks of land and is lethal to most grazing animals.
There is as much, if not more of the weed than I remember, but each plant seem fragile and sparse. I wonder if it's because of me, or the drought. Last year, I was caught up in sharing with my husband, his long, difficult road to death, and didn't get out to spray. I left the horses in the field much longer than usual and my pasture took a beating. The long dry winter and spring injured it even more.
This year I'm keeping the horses penned, trying three different grass restoration techniques, and mulching the crap out of the bald spots. All nice and earth friendly, except for, you know, the poison part. I'll mulch over the dead spots and see what comes up by fall.
Cowboy lore tells me locoweed is addictive. Science challenges this notion. If the grazing is healthy, livestock passes it by. By the time horses and cattle are eating locoweed, it's generally the only forage left. It grows fast, fills in the bare spots and blooms two, sometimes three times a year. It's green, they eat it, it's poison, they die.
If I jump to thinking like Clint, I know I can clear out the cantina full of murderous outlaws. The only problem is, bad guys can only take over the pueblo if it's population is weak. If I don't get this town to grow some cajones they'll be under seige by another gang of desperados before the next Day of the Dead festival.
Overgrazed ground is what allows locowwed to take hold. I bought into this problem when we purchased our place, but it's only now I have an idea of how this works. If a horse has the option, when it sees a field of locoweed, it will move off and graze elsewhere. Thus, the locoweed has protected the damaged ground beneath it. It kept the grass ripping, ground impacting horses off it, stopped the wind from blowing the fragile topsoil to Kansas and gave the soil a chance to rest. Slowly the land is restored by locoweed roots breaking up the soil and feeds itself by from the twice a year compost provided by the twice blooming locoweed. Some grass will begin to grow back, sheltered by the shade of the tall prairie flower. Eventually, healthy grass will choke out weeds and reclaim the lost ground.
If the ground is so damaged, or the pasture so limited, the horses have no choice but to eat it, the animals will die, fertilize the ground and give it yet another chance to recover. Evil genius, I'm telling you.
Back to Clint. What if, instead of acting like a superior jackass, I didn't charge into town and shoot my percieved bad guys willy-nilly? Maybe, take the time to understand why they were in the cantina in the first place. Then, share my knowledge of defense with the overwhelmed population and they'd fight back on their own. If we're lucky, get a few of those bad guys to come over to our side before driving the rest of them out of town.
Huh. I don't know if I'm right, but it feels like it. I think I'll leave one patch of the weed and bolster the grass around it. It will be interesting to watch and see what happens.
"Tomorrow is promised to no one, you bastards,"
It goes against my nature, poisoning things, so it's easy to pretend I'm a lone outlaw, regretfully creating mayhem and murder in order to protect the youngun's back home. The upright citizen in me tries to control weeds with mowing and rotational grazing, but that frigging locoweed can kill my horses and goats, and I've declared war. War calls for extreme measures, in my case,
I think about the morality of poisoning a natural, Colorado native plant. If I take it out of the cycle, what is the replacement going to be? When I poison it, what will grow in it's place? Everything has a reason, although the point of this fast spreading weed with beautiful purple flowers is beyond me. It takes over huge chunks of land and is lethal to most grazing animals.
There is as much, if not more of the weed than I remember, but each plant seem fragile and sparse. I wonder if it's because of me, or the drought. Last year, I was caught up in sharing with my husband, his long, difficult road to death, and didn't get out to spray. I left the horses in the field much longer than usual and my pasture took a beating. The long dry winter and spring injured it even more.
This year I'm keeping the horses penned, trying three different grass restoration techniques, and mulching the crap out of the bald spots. All nice and earth friendly, except for, you know, the poison part. I'll mulch over the dead spots and see what comes up by fall.
Cowboy lore tells me locoweed is addictive. Science challenges this notion. If the grazing is healthy, livestock passes it by. By the time horses and cattle are eating locoweed, it's generally the only forage left. It grows fast, fills in the bare spots and blooms two, sometimes three times a year. It's green, they eat it, it's poison, they die.
If I jump to thinking like Clint, I know I can clear out the cantina full of murderous outlaws. The only problem is, bad guys can only take over the pueblo if it's population is weak. If I don't get this town to grow some cajones they'll be under seige by another gang of desperados before the next Day of the Dead festival.
Overgrazed ground is what allows locowwed to take hold. I bought into this problem when we purchased our place, but it's only now I have an idea of how this works. If a horse has the option, when it sees a field of locoweed, it will move off and graze elsewhere. Thus, the locoweed has protected the damaged ground beneath it. It kept the grass ripping, ground impacting horses off it, stopped the wind from blowing the fragile topsoil to Kansas and gave the soil a chance to rest. Slowly the land is restored by locoweed roots breaking up the soil and feeds itself by from the twice a year compost provided by the twice blooming locoweed. Some grass will begin to grow back, sheltered by the shade of the tall prairie flower. Eventually, healthy grass will choke out weeds and reclaim the lost ground.
If the ground is so damaged, or the pasture so limited, the horses have no choice but to eat it, the animals will die, fertilize the ground and give it yet another chance to recover. Evil genius, I'm telling you.
Back to Clint. What if, instead of acting like a superior jackass, I didn't charge into town and shoot my percieved bad guys willy-nilly? Maybe, take the time to understand why they were in the cantina in the first place. Then, share my knowledge of defense with the overwhelmed population and they'd fight back on their own. If we're lucky, get a few of those bad guys to come over to our side before driving the rest of them out of town.
Huh. I don't know if I'm right, but it feels like it. I think I'll leave one patch of the weed and bolster the grass around it. It will be interesting to watch and see what happens.
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