Jason E. Andersen

I delivered a webinar this week on controlling Canada thistle. During my research for that talk, I came across something that I thought was interesting.

Bonus Fun Fact: Canada thistle was the first noxious weed recognized in the United States, by Vermont in 1795. It actually occurred before there was a United States at all (US independence occurred in 1776, if you don’t remember your US history). Furthermore, Canada thistle was (accidentally) introduced to North America in the early 1600’s, right along with European settlement. It’s been a problem ever since! For literally hundreds of years, farmers have been battling Canada thistle. Interesting and sort of sad.

Bonus Bonus Fun Fact: For the most part, in the rest of the world outside North America, the common name for Canada thistle is creeping thistle. After all, it existed and was a problem well before the United States and Canada were around. People had to call it something!