5-11 IAN Pulling Weeds

 Who woulda’ thunk weeds would be a big budget item but coming to Idaho soon is some serious stimulus money to control weeds. I’m David Sparks and I’ll have that story in a minute. If only I had known. Hindsight’s 20-20, we all know that but if I’d known back when I was a kid that I could make millions pullin’ weeds, I never would have gone for an undergraduate degree and two graduate degrees. I remember working for a farmer and getting paid 75 cents/an hour to pull weeds. It was hard work, and even though I got pretty good at it, I figured there wasn’t much of a future in it.

 But wait and listen to this.  The U.S. Bureau of Land Management will pass $1.3 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act through the Idaho State Department of Agriculture to control the weeds on tens of thousands of public acres. Counties across Idaho will get some help this year battling noxious weeds, thanks to a federal stimulus award that was recently announced. Here’s Idaho Department of Agriculture Public Information Officer, Pam Juker: “This is just another great opportunity to partner with federal and local governments to help reduce the spread of noxious weeds.” I’m sure the program isn’t calling for teen aged weed pullers but for what it’s worth after doing the math, you could pay 75 cents an hour and get 1,733,333 hours of weed pulling for that 1.3 million dollar stimulus package.