Many, many years ago when Bob Lusk was still pulling a small boat around, he came here and did a pond assessment. Everything went well until we got to the north end of the pond, and looked at a pretty good sized patch of water primrose. What Bob saw though, was about a 1 foot square patch of pennywart right in the middle.
He then told me something I never forgot. " There's always one plant waiting to take the place of another plant, so be careful what you kill, because the alternative could be worse."
Heeding good solid info as I normally do, I proceeded to ignore Bob's advice, and treat the entire patch of primrose. It died, but the small patch of pennywart didn't. Within a year, the entire area was covered with pennywart, and multiple treatments over several years were required to completely eradicate it.
So over the last 2 years, I have eliminated over 4 acres of American Lotus, a 30' wide swath of waterleaf half way around my 11 acre pond, and most of 6-7 acres of coontail.
When all the above died, this is what's naturally taking it's place. I got lucky, and had all the shoreline cover I needed, but it was buried by true invasives. So looking back, Bob was 100% correct. I just had such a mess, the alternatives had to be better.
For reference, the pond is about two and a half feet low right now.
This is arrowhead and water primrose that was buried under coontail and lotus. Also, the 2 gravel filled kiddie pools were put out for CNBG years ago. With the coontail gone, this is the first year they were used.
American pondweed popping up all around the pond
Another pic of American pondweed and water primrose. This patch was under the lotus, and never thrived.
