About invasive plants
A quiet, creeping, and ruthless expansion is unfolding in the fields, roadsides, and forests of our country. The enemy is easily recognizable by its giant umbrellas, reaching a height of three meters, or by its bright, beautiful yellow brooms…
Sosnowsky's hogweed and its close relative, Mantegazzi's hogweed, along with Canadian goldenrod, are not just an Eastern European problem.
In the UK, giant hogweed has been terrorizing riverbanks and wastelands for decades. Britons spend millions of pounds on herbicides and use "biological weapons" – they drive special breeds of sheep and pigs onto infested areas, whose stomachs can digest poisonous plants without harm to their health. In Germany, the fight against invasives has also been elevated to the rank of a national task: they actively use mechanical destruction, literally digging out hogweed roots by hand with the help of volunteers and municipal services. The Baltic states have strict state programs for mapping and chemically treating every square meter occupied by the alien.
In Belarus, the state has launched a decisive legal and practical counteroffensive. From June 19, 2026, amendments to the Code of Administrative Offenses will come into force, providing for significant fines for land users – up to 10 base units. This measure is designed to awaken those landowners who have watched for years as poisonous umbrellas and yellow rhizomes creep from behind their fences onto neighboring lands.
One Sosnowsky's hogweed plant can produce up to 70,000 seeds, which can lie in the soil and retain their viability for up to 15 years. If a field is flooded with herbicide, the above-ground part will die. But the seeds in the ground will remain untouched. After a few years, the chemicals will be washed out, and the hogweed will produce new shoots. In addition, hogweed has a powerful taproot with renewal buds hidden at a depth of 5-8 cm.
A constant companion of Sosnowsky's hogweed in our fields is the Canadian goldenrod, a decorative newcomer from North America. It releases substances into the soil that suppress the growth of other plants and produces up to 100,000 seeds per bush per season. According to specialists, goldenrod is even more aggressive than hogweed, completely displacing native flora from natural ecosystems.
Proper crop rotation is the only absolute weapon against invasives. Bringing land into agricultural circulation solves the problem radically and forever. Where a real, caring owner comes to the land, there is no place for strangers. The only condition for this victory is to continue the fight, methodically reclaiming every hectare from invasives. And then, instead of poisonous umbrellas, bread will always ripen and rapeseed will brightly yellow on our lands.