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Controlling Phragmites: Where We Are
Your Lake Charlevoix Association is the lead organization coordinating public and private efforts to control phragmites growth on our shoreline. Here’s where we are on the various stages of the project:
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 Volunteer Vasco Zucchiatti measures a phragmites stand at Young State Park on July 29 as part of the LCA effort to mark all such stands around the lake. Photo by Jan Evans. Click here to view additional photos.
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Identifying the sites
Last winter we toured most of the lake by snowmobile and found more than 100 suspected sites that we tagged with GPS coordinates and mapped with the help of county officials. Over six weeks in July and August, 43 volunteers conducted a followup survey, mostly by boat, on Charlevoix and Round lakes. In almost all cases, the stands where flagged with blue markers and GPS coordinates recorded to make it easy for workers to find and treat the plants with a herbicide in the second or third week of September.
Getting permission
We are gathering permission slips from all property owners with phragmites stands to allow us to come on the land and spray the plants. The townships around the lake have generally adopted ordinances that would let a court order a property owner to cooperate, but we have found owners unanimously willing to let us do the treatment. Most, naturally, expect to take an active part in the later process of cutting off seedheads, cutting the stalks and disposing of the dead plant material. We’ll distribute more information to property owners as the phragmites growing season ends and before the herbicide treatment begins.
The Role of Volunteers
While private contractors will do much of the work of applying the herbicide, we still need volunteers to do that on certain smaller stands. And we need your help in the latter cutting and taking away of the dead plants.
We’ve got training sessions scheduled for later this month at two locations. Dr Roberta Dow and Dean Solomon from the MSU extension service will provide the technical guidance on the proper treatment of Phragmites with herbicide. We will emphasize personal safety and environmental stewardship in handling and disposing of the herbicide. The LCA team will also provide information about the removal and disposal of the seed heads and stalks.
Please let us know (by email to info@lakecharlevoix.org) if you can help and which session you will attend. Bring neighbors and friends who can help with the treatment (and harvest!)
- August 18 7-9 P.M.at the Friends of the Jordan Watershed Center, East Jordan (Off Bridge Street - we’ll have some blue Phragmites flags posted by the turn)
- August 20 3-5 P.M. at the Boyne City Library community room
Who Is Paying For This?
The service to property owner is FREE. (Of course, affected property owners are free to make a contribution to LCA if they would like to do so.)
An initial round of financing for LCA is coming from the Charlevoix County Community Foundation, to get us started on the educational effort and the survey work. State money is coming from the Department of Natural Resources under a grant that funds phragmites treatment in a large section of Northern Michigan coastline. A contractor will be hired to do the majority of the treatment on our lake. We are hopeful of some public funding for the removal and proper disposal of the seedheads and dead plant material.
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