City considering sheep solution to leafy spurge problem

The City of Moose Jaw is considering a unique solution to an ongoing noxious weed problem in the Brittania Park area: sheep and goats.

During the executive committee meeting on June 11 at City Hall, a motion to allow the use of the small ruminants for weed control in the city was approved after discussion regarding the cost of the program and other potential issues.

The situation came to committee due to Bylaw 5432 covering the Keeping of Animals, which prohibits the keeping of goats and sheep in city limits. As a result, a special exemption was needed to have the plan put into motion. The Brittania Park area is largely pasture land and has dealt with a leafy spurge infestation in recent years. The city had previously used herbicides to deal with the unwanted plants, but modification of the Invasive Plant Control Program – which previously allowed the purchase of herbicides at 50 per cent of normal prices – lead to heavily increased costs. What cost the city $6,451 in 2017 was going to rise to $10,700 this year. That increase was deemed prohibitive by the Parks and Recreation Department and resulted alternative measures being investigated. The animal solution of sheep and goats had been used successfully in Wakamow Valley in years past, a program that included an academic study and was one of the first of it’s kind. It’s also been implemented in other cities in western Canada – including Calgary and Edmonton. Concerns regarding the cost of using sheep and goats were raised by councillors, especially whether or not the $10,700 in herbicide application would cost less than the animals and their attendant shepherd.

Parks gardener Sarah Regent revealed that the spurge problem was bad enough that the amount of herbicide purchased with those funds wouldn’t cover the area needed and that the animal control solution would stay within the current budget for the program.

The decision to allow the plan to proceed passed unanimously, with costing out of the program and other information now to be gathered for final approval by city council.

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Tim Mack of MackSun Solar gave a presentation to city council requesting a one-year extension on their agreement to operate a 10 megawatt solar farm on land west of Hamilton Flats. The request was the third of it’s kind since the project’s approval by city council in October 2016 and came about due to continued delays by SaskPower in their request for proposal process.

MackSun Solar plans to build the farm covering approximately 130 acres and including a Saskatchewan Polytechnic research and education centre. They are awaiting approval by SaskPower to undertake the project. Their request for an extension to their offer to purchase to June 30, 2019 was passed by council.

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Final approval was given to a pair of waste management bylaw amendments, officially setting the waste and recycling collection fee at $9.77 a month, as well as the official implementation of commercial tipping fees at the landfill, with $69 per tonne for local users and $89 for out-of-town users.

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The new bicycle helmet bylaw was also passed and brought into effect. It is now illegal for anyone under 16 to ride a bicycle without a helmet in the city of Moose Jaw.