Canadian Fleabane is a very common weed in Australia and around the world. As the name suggests it is a plant which is common to North America and which has been used for various medicinal purposes. However with the advent of modern cropping and agriculture Canadian Fleabane has become a noxious weed in North America where it invades farm crops and wreaks havoc as a result. As it has spread around the world as an introduced species it has become a nuisance for cropping around the world, as well as invading natural habitats and our lawns and gardens and even our streets.
Canadian Fleabane is highly resilient and is able to establish itself in the most uncanny and almost impossible places, tiny seeds can float along our roads until they find even the tiniest crack of soil between the asphalt of the road and the concrete of the curb, and will start growing, and quite high at that.
The broad spectrum weed killer Glyphosate, most commonly known as Roundup by many, has for a long time seen natural resistance in Canadian Fleabane, making this control method more and more useless as the years pass on.
The weed is easily spread by a massive abundance of seeds on each plant which are attached to those little white parachute-like hairy heads which allow the seeds to float through the air on wind and to be carried around roads, paths and gardens with the breeze.
Botanical name: Conya canadensis - formerly Erigeron canadensis
Canadian Fleabane And Lawns And Gardens
Fortunately Canadian Fleabane is not a real problem for lawns as regular lawn mowing will continually cut back the weed from its youth so it can never grow and mature, and eventually the weed will just naturally die away without us even realising it. If however we never mow our lawns but once or twice a year then we’re going to have big problems with the proliferation of this weed very quickly.
Gardens are a different scenario again for Canadian Fleabane, wherein if we do not regularly till and maintain our gardens then the Canadian Fleabane will grow to maturity and produce an abundance of seeds which will quickly take over the rest of our gardens too.
If we see any Canadian Fleabane around our property at all, whether it be in the cracks on footpaths or roads or nature strips, we should remove them as soon as possible to stop an infestation into our own lawns and gardens.
Treatment of Canadian Fleabane
As already mentioned Canadian Fleabane is becoming more and more resistant to Glyphosate all the time, we can of course try it if we want to, but to me I don’t really see the point unless we are dealing with hundreds or thousands of these weeds in a larger area.
Manual removal is my own preferred choice.
Small Canadian Fleabane weeds can be cut back with a lawn mower or line trimmer, so long as they are not seeding as this would only spread more weed seeds and make more weeds. If there is any regrowth of these weeds seen again, we just cut them back again. We can also hand pull them rather easily for even better results.
The taller Canadian Fleabane which can grow up to a metre high, and which will be covered in thousands upon thousands of seeds can more difficult to remove. They should not be mowed over or attempted to be slashed as this will only spread their seed all over our gardens. The best method here is to use a plastic bag tied around the top of the Canadian Fleabane seed head area, then to use a small spade to help ease the root from the soil as we pull the weed from the ground. We then put the weed in the bin, and never into a compost pile.
Final advice on Canadian Fleabane… remove it as soon as it’s seen, as quickly as possible.
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