The Education and Outreach Subcommittee of the 4 County Cooperative Weed Management Association has developed a list of 11 weeds to be used in educational tools of several formats.  It is expected that some version of a "weed of the month" outline could be used in products such as a series of newspaper articles, calendars, informational cards, and brochures.  As part of creating this list, the subcommittee looked at many candidates, keeping the following criteria in mind.

The weeds should be:

• Grown horticulturally, or occur in gardens or nearby urban landscapes.
• Weeds of some consequence.
• Identifiable by the public after some education.
• Most choices should be somewhat new or otherwise not high on the radar screen of the average gardener, or would not be known as a natural area invasive to most gardeners (as opposed to Himalayan blackberry, etc.)
  

Since these weeds may be presented on a monthly basis through newspaper articles or similar ways, we also sought to list 12 weeds that would be present and identifiable at key points throughout the year.  The weed would be matched with that particular month.  One species was pulled from the list at the request of the Oregon Association of Nurseries so the next batch of weed profiles, which will likely be developed in 2008, will likely include 13 species so that there are 24 months worth of weed profiles.  These profiles can be re-printed and used for educational purposes.