Kenyan govt. spends 290 million Ksh to destroy water hyacinth from Lake Victoria-2011
Lake Okeechobee in Florida in USA
Water hyacinth in Bangladeshis known as Kochuripana. It is a tropical floating aquatic plant. Its scientific name is Eichornia crassipes. Of its Genus has seven variant species. Its origin in Latin America. Then it spread out gradually all over the world. Water hyacinth grows and spreads rapidly in fresh water. Just imagine, a singel plant under ideal conditions can produce 3000 others in 50 days and can cover an area of 600 sq meters in a year.
Water hyacinth or Kachuripana was introduced from its native home South America to various countries as well as in the USA in the 1880's, in Australia in 1890's, in Africa in 1950's and in Bangladesh sometime in the latter part of the 19th century.
Water hyacinth(Kachuripana) plant is a free-floating aquatic plant that sends down a large bunch of long fibrous roots from a leafy main stem. Its dark green leaves are 10-20 cm across and float above the water surface. They have long, spongy and bulbous stalks. Water hyacinth(Kochuripana) plant size ranges from a few cm to a meter in hight. The flower of this plant develop on a spike and have six individual petals that join at the bottom to produce a tube-like bloom. The colour of these flowers vary from a lighter shade of blue to violet with a yellow marking-like eyr or spot on the petals.
Still now water hyacinth(Kochuripana) is a problem in the USA. In the beginning they used arsenic to destroy and wipe out this plant and could partially clear the weeds but poisoned the ecosystem. They tried also with fire and explosives. In Africa lake Victoria's many areas are now paralyzed due to this plant.
In Bangladesh water hyacinth(Kochuripana) was also a very big problem. Water ways were blocked and nevigation were almost impossible. In the provincial election in 1937 all the major political parties promised to eradicate the water hyacinth. After the election the politicians kept their words and that worked. Now in Bangladesh water hyacinth(Kochuripana) is not seen as a problem, it still exists in haors and beels.
If you make a heap of water hyacinth(Kochuripana), when decayed, make wonderful fertilizer for cropping.Moreover, some crops and vegetables grow luxuriously on the dressed water hyacinth (Kochuripana) heaps. This has attracted many landless peasants to accumulate and heap water hyacinth(Kochuripana) to make floating fields for agricultural production.
S:en.wikipedia.org; water-hyacinth.com; banglapedia.org; aquaticcommunity.com; naturia.per.sg/buloh/; wiki.bugwood.org/archive:bcipeus/eichhornia_crassipes; environment.go.ke .
Read also: Floating garden-uses of water hyacinth(kochuripana)Bangladesh way to solv the problem
Water hyacinth can be made into biofuel in several ways. Its fiber is useful in such things as furniture making. It has been used for livestock feed (cattle and rabbits). The world must make aggressive use of these weeds and all the others. The weeds are conquering the earth, and turning it into a desert.
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