Invasive Plant Highlight: Yellow Flag Iris

Yellow flag iris: that deceptively pretty plant that seems like the perfect addiction to your garden or ornamental pond. But don’t let this attractive plant fool you! Once established, yellow flag iris can quickly out-compete its neighbors, monopolizing valuable nutrients and dominating yard space. What’s worst is that all parts of this plant are toxic to humans and animals – not great if there are little ones or pets in your household.

Yellow flag iris has negative impacts on the natural environment as well. The roots of this plant can form thick, dense mats that can block water flow and displace native plants, which can dry out wetlands and alter ecosystem balance. This plant also reduces habitat available for wildlife, including native fish habitat and bird nesting and rearing sites.

For all of these reasons, our Operations team at CKISS prioritized yellow flag iris removal around the Nelson area, including Bird Creek Marsh near the Kootenay Canal and boat-access only sites along Kootenay Lake. We also lead two community weed pull events for this plant! Overall, we were able to remove over 5000 kilograms of yellow flag iris from the area. That's huge!

Thank you to everyone who supported this project and reported yellow flag iris through our CKISS Priority Invasive Plants 2021 project! Every observation helps.

Publicado el diciembre 20, 2021 07:54 TARDE por ckiss_kootenay