Weeds, Weeds, Weeds!!!

Dear friends of Lake Attitash,
 
We have been asking a lot of you lately and it seems our work is never done!
 
Lake Attitash needs you to attend the next Amesbury Conservation Commission meeting on May 1, at Amesbury City Hall, at 6:30 pm
 
Amesbury and Merrimac residents are asked to attend to show their support for the lake.
 
Thanks to a great deal of effort by Representatives Lenny Mirra, Jim Kelcourse and Senator O’Connor Ives, the Lake Association is the recipient of $20,000 of State money to help us manage our invasive weeds this year. This money has been sent to the Town of Merrimac. Bid specifications for the weed treatment have gone out and the contract has been awarded.  We are ready to begin treatment of invasive curly leaf pondweed and milfoil in mid-May.
 
Much to our surprise, the Amesbury Conservation Commission asked us to amend our Order of Conditions (the permit that allows us to contract for our usual spot treatment of invasive weeds) which is valid until 2019. They want an extension of our vegetative management plan which is an attachment within our Order of Conditions. We submitted everything we were asked for and completed a notice to abutters and a legal notice in the paper. This is a complex process that involves a public hearing, scheduled for May 1.
 
What you need to know

• The $20,000 from the State has to be spent before June 30^th.
• The curly leaf pondweed starts to propagate early in the year and as a result this spot treatment needs to happen in mid-May to be effective.
• The curly-leaf pondweed is spreading around the lake and needs to be taken care of.
• Milfoil spreads rapidly and would make our lake look like Meadowbrook in short order if we did not go after it every year.
• Without Conservation Commission approval, nothing will happen, and the funds will go back to the State.

 
We cannot afford any last minute glitches.
 
Note: Everyone needs to be reminded that the awful nuisance pondweed that we all struggled with last year is a native plant and permits cannot be obtained to target native weeds.