Arsenic-Eating Ferns a Failure
· Posted Tuesday August 22, 2006 by jamie
So apparently the experimental plantings of Chinese brake fern at Point Defiance Park and elsewhere to filter out some of the arsenic in the soil are a bust. According to an article in today’s Trib, the ferns have drawn arsenic form the soil, but they can’t survive in our climate and are dying. So that’s kind of a bummer from the perspective of a natural cleanup method. But I was taken aback by one quote in the article:
“The upside is they’re not invasive,” [Ecology Departement investigator Norm] Peck said. That’s in contrast to Florida, where the fast-proliferating ferns have been labeled alien intruders.
So let me get this right… We didn’t know whether or not this would be an invasive species before we planted it in the most beloved patch of forest in our city? I’m thinking we should have tried to figure out the invasive thing first…
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categories: tacoma environment
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