09.26.06
Cowbane update Gilford residents concerned
Some more publicity has been given to this potentially-lethal-to-grazing-animals plant in town…
(see previous blog post Poisonous cowbane growing in Gilford, N.H. dated 08/29/06)
Article posted in Laconia Citizen (based on interview with Connie Moses, Gilford resident):
Toxic plant found in Gilford, Laconia Citizen Online (also ran in Laconia Citizen print Edition of September 5, 2006 pg. B1)
Article posted on equinesite.com (submitted by Connie Moses):
Cowbane aka. Spotted Water Hemlock poisonous to horses and livestock equinesite.com News Center Sept. 1, 2006
I received several telephone calls after the Citizen article ran, which resulted in my making a few trips to neighboring locations to attempt to identify their plants.
A local shepherd and hay farmer visited so I could show him what the cowbane looked like, and he recognized it from a previous encounter… he had waded through a thicket of it (last year) near a brook close to U.N.H. when it was flowering, and he thinks the pollen caused his windpipe to constrict. He choked up and became almost unable to breathe. In fact he was headed for a hospital when the symptoms subsided, that’s how bad his reaction was. He remembered exactly what it looked like because he couldn’t identify it at the time. Having lost 2 lambs mysteriously this spring, this shepherd returned to search his pastures for the Spotted Water Hemlock.
This message was received from a nearby neighbor:
I just want to thank you for the article in the paper. I was getting ready to dig out that [cowbane] weed and fortunately I saw the article so I used better protection than I did last year, I had some trouble with something I dug up last year. We had quite a bit of cowbane running around our deck. Thanks for the article, it probably saved me some agony.
A farmer in nearby Gilmanton identified cowbane growing in his horse pasture, and set out to remove it. He was concerned because of his horse and because he lives upstream of Crystal Lake.
A reporter from the Weirs Times came and took photos of us in a huge stand of cowbane about 1/2 acre in size. I have not heard if an article was run, and that batch of cowbane has since been mowed to the ground by the landowner.
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Connie Moses, petArtist– self-built website: PortraitsWithHorses.com
(horse and pet portraits)
