Best Practices for Controlling Potentially Invasive Energy Crops
While some dedicated energy crops can be easily defined as invasive, and avoided as such, many others are more difficult to classify. Some crops may not be invasive in certain geographies or climates while becoming invasive in others. Management practices may also determine if a crop has the potential to be invasive or not. Regardless, several preventative best practices can be used to mitigate any risks.
When establishing a potentially invasive energy crop, care must be taken in the design and layout of production fields. Fields should be located away from channels of dispersal for seeds or plant material. These channels could include a highway corridor or more importantly, a river or stream. Water can disperse seeds and material very quickly. To aid in this control, some planting stock production entities are working to introduce crops that produce sterile seeds, do not produce seeds at all, or flower at a delayed rate (seeds do not mature). These crop improvements will also make invasiveness less of a concern.
When establishing fields, buffers of at least 20-30 feet around the entire field should be utilized. These buffers could be planted in a row crop or non-invasive crop where any potential movement of the energy crop could be easily controlled with herbicides or cultural practices like mowing.
Finally, before establishing the field, you should have a clearly developed plan to eradicate the material once it has passed its productive life. An eradication plan should be effective in removing the entire field of growing stock.
Harvesting potentially invasive energy crops presents new challenges. For crops that reach maturity and could contain viable seeds or vegetative material, care must be taken to control harvested material. In baling situations, bale wrap should be used to prevent material from falling out of bales during handling and transport. Several products are available on the market that would enable such control. For forage chopped material, care must be taken to clean up material spills in the field or at field edge.
When moving harvesting equipment between fields or harvesting locations, the machinery should be thoroughly cleaned of all vegetative material to prevent spreading seeds or vegetative material during transport and into the next field. Cleaning can be done with pressure washers, brooms, or other methods, though the more complete the cleaning, the more effective the control.
Once material is harvested, best practices for controlling invasiveness focus on material control. During transport, all loads should be secured. Chopped material should be transported in covered trailers. Likewise, in storage, material should be monitored. Storage areas should have buffers that would allow for the control of seeds or vegetative material that may sprout. The bottom line is that if the material is contained throughout transport and storage, invasiveness should not be an issue.
As with anything, proper planning and management can ensure success in controlling potentially invasive energy crops. While strongly invasive energy crops should be avoided, best management practices can help control the potential invasiveness of crops that may not be classified as strongly invasive.
To evaluate your feedstock options and any potential invasiveness issues, contact Genera Energy today!
By Sam Jackson, VP Business Development
