Weeds, Weather Making For Bad Allergy Season

With warmer weather, it means plants are blooming and weeds are sprouting, and if you suffer from allergies, you are already seeing signs of pollen in the air.

Allergy sufferers can’t seem to escape the pollen in the air, thanks to the high winds Eastern Idaho has been experiencing, and this is bringing more weeds earlier in the season.

“What I am expecting this year is we are going to finally warm up, and it is going to go poof! The pollen will go crazy; it will be high and heavy but short-lived, and then we will go into the regular-season pattern,” said Dr. Gene Petty, Idaho Allergy and Asthma Clinic.

Allergies can cause people to have a runny nose, itchy eyes, headaches and difficulty breathing, among others symptoms.

“I feel like I have been going at like 70 percent,” said a patient of Petty’s.

“The overall effect on the body of severe allergy is exhausting. Patients will come in dragging, and they are spending all their energy just trying to breath to get air into their body,” said Dr. Petty.

There are ways to help your symptoms with over-the-counter medicines such as pills, nasal sprays and syrups, but if the symptoms are really bad, you can see your local allergist to get a skin test and possibly have shots.

“Decrease the enemy by building up your own army,” said Dr. Petty.

The Bonneville County Weeds Department said it has had a hard time getting out to do weed control because of the windy and rainy weather. Thursday was the first day workers finally started spraying the saturated ground.

“It leaves the level of moisture in the ground longer, so you have roots have a longer time to absorb that moisture, take up the nutrients. So the weeds will be a lot healthy than what we have seen in the years past.,” said Jeffrey Pettingill, Supervisor of The Bonneville County Weeds Department.

He said it is a good idea to keep your lawn mowed.

“Wash off your lawn mower, weed eaters, any kind of machinery so you aren’t spreading the weeds from one lot to another,” said Pettingill.

He also recommended if you see a weed you don’t recognize, call the department and report its location.

There are 64 noxious weeds in the state of Idaho. These are determined by their ability to cause harm to people or land.