Researchers plant garden full of weeds at Brandon's Assiniboine Community College

Weeds exasperate gardeners when they overtake a garden or a lawn, but a garden full of the usually unwelcome plants is exactly what a Brandon community college wanted.

On Wednesday afternoon, theAssiniboine Community College unveiled its weed identification garden, home to about 80 different species of weeds. The plants willbe used for research by students in horticulture, agriculture and environment programs, as well as by agricultural professionals and homeowners.

"In order to make really good long term weed management decisions, a person needs to know what they're dealing with," said Danielle Tichit, agribusiness program instructor.

Tichit said the garden will allow users to study various annual and perennial weeds are different stages. Most are common to Manitoba, like buckwheat or stinkweed, but she said some less common varieties are being grown as well.

Weeds like Purple Loosestrife, Tansey, and Japanse and DowneyBrome.

Months-long search for weeds

But finding all of those weedsturned out to be quite the task.

"Some came in with the topsoil, which was nice" she said, chuckling. "For months and months now, I've been keeping my eye on the ground and every time I find something we dig it up and bring it in or collect the seed off it."

The months-long task of locating and planting all of the weeds in the garden has been a learning experience for students taking agribusiness.

Student Natasha Hines said she's enjoying being able to study weeds up close and is hoping to use her knowledgein her future career.

"I think it'll benefit a lot of people," she said.

Weed wish list

Among the garden's first group of researchers will be a group of Manitoba Agriculture employees who will be embarking on a province-wide weed survey of 640 fields.

"We're using this as one of our jumping off training points," said provincial weed specialist Jeanette Gaultier.

Gaultier said it's been about 15 years since the last weed survey in Manitoba. They are typically done once per decade and help track where certain species are growing in the province.

In the prairies, unlike other parts of the country, weeds are the top issuebringing down crop yields, said Gaultier.

"So it's really important... to understand how some of the changes in our cropping system as it evolves, how our weeds are evolving with it," said Gaultier.

The college's garden won't stop at its current bounty of 80 plants. Tichithopes to start a wish list of weed species in the near future so the garden can expand.

The garden open to the public weekdays at the college's North Hill campus. The garden cost about $57,000 and was a gift from the Manitoba Zero-Till Research Association.