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Item: Divers get up close, personal with milfoil/Becky Kramer, SR
Diver
Glenn Edwards emerges from the bottom of the St. Joe River, just south
of St. Maries on Friday after removing milfoil from the riverbed.
(Full-size photo)
More Info: Decked out in diver’s gear, Glenn Edwards submerged for a search-and-destroy mission Friday. His target: Eurasian milfoil. The invasive aquatic weed has gained a toehold in the St. Joe River, a tributary of Lake Coeur d’Alene. To keep the milfoil from invading new territory downstream, the Coeur d’Alene Tribe hired divers to suction it off the river bottom. “We don’t want it spreading northward into the lake,” said Dave Lamb, the tribe’s lake ecologist. Earlier this month, the tribe sprayed 100 acres of southern Lake Coeur d’Alene with an aquatic herbicide, 2, 4-D. The herbicide effectively combats milfoil where it forms thick mats of floating vegetation. But it’s less practical for fighting smaller pockets of the weed in flowing waters.
Question: Do you think the Coeur d’Alene Indian Tribe is more concerned about the health of Lake Coeur d’Alene and the North Idaho environment than local and state governments?
D.F. Oliveria is a columnist and blogger for The Spokesman-Review. Huckleberries Online was judged the best 2008 Idaho newspaper blog by the Idaho Press Club. And the best 2007 news blog in the Pacific Northwest by the Society for Professional Journalist. Print Huckleberries is a past winner of the Herb Caen Memorial Column contest by the National Association of Newspaper Columnists. The Readership Institute of Northwestern University cited this blog as a good example of online community journalism.
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HonestGeorge on July 12 at 3:18 p.m.
The milfoil problem had been haphazardly addressed in the past but there was never enough money available to attack it like the Tribe is able to do. Their coffers are a bit fuller, with fewer restraints, than those of the waterways groups.
otisgexperience on July 13 at 12:33 p.m.
If we throw enough trash in the water, would that smother out the milfoil?