2017 Colorado Revised Statutes
Title 35 - Agriculture
Pest and Weed Control
Article 5.5 - Colorado Noxious Weed Act
§ 35-5.5-103. Definitions

As used in this article, unless the context otherwise requires:

(1) (Deleted by amendment, L. 96, p. 764, § 5, effective May 23, 1996.)

(2) "Alien plant" means a plant species that is not indigenous to the state of Colorado.

(3) (Deleted by amendment, L. 96, p. 764, § 5, effective May 23, 1996.)

(4) "Commissioner" means the commissioner of the department of agriculture or his or her designee.

(4.5) "Department" means the department of agriculture.

(5) "District" means a local governing body's geographic description of a land area where noxious weeds are to be managed.

(6) (Deleted by amendment, L. 96, p. 764, § 5, effective May 23, 1996.)

(7) "Federal agency" means each agency, bureau, or department of the federal government responsible for administering or managing federal land.

(8) "Federal land manager" means the federal agency having jurisdiction over any federal lands affected by the provisions of this article.

(9) "Integrated management" means the planning and implementation of a coordinated program utilizing a variety of methods for managing noxious weeds, the purpose of which is to achieve specified management objectives and promote desirable plant communities. Such methods may include but are not limited to education, preventive measures, good stewardship, and the following techniques:

(a) "Biological management", which means the use of an organism to disrupt the growth of noxious weeds.

(b) "Chemical management", which means the use of herbicides or plant growth regulators to disrupt the growth of noxious weeds.

(c) "Cultural management", which means methodologies or management practices that favor the growth of desirable plants over noxious weeds, including maintaining an optimum fertility and plant moisture status in an area, planting at optimum density and spatial arrangement in an area, and planting species most suited to an area.

(d) "Mechanical management", which means methodologies or management practices that physically disrupt plant growth, including tilling, mowing, burning, flooding, mulching, hand-pulling, hoeing, and grazing.

(10) "Landowner" means any owner of record of federal, tribal, state, county, municipal, or private land.

(10.5) "Local advisory board" means those individuals appointed by the local governing body to advise on matters of noxious weed management.

(11) "Local governing body" means the board of county commissioners of a county, the city council of a city and county or statutory or home rule city, the board of trustees of a statutory town or home rule town, or the board of selectmen or city council of a territorial charter municipality, as the context so requires.

(11.4) "Local noxious weed" means any plant of local importance that has been declared a noxious weed by the local governing body.

(11.6) "Management" means any activity that prevents a plant from establishing, reproducing, or dispersing itself.

(11.7) "Management objective" means the specific, desired result of integrated management efforts and includes:

(a) "Eradication" which means reducing the reproductive success of a noxious weed species or specified noxious weed population in largely uninfested regions to zero and permanently eliminating the species or population within a specified period of time. Once all specified weed populations are eliminated or prevented from reproducing, intensive efforts continue until the existing seed bank is exhausted.

(b) "Containment" which means maintaining an intensively managed buffer zone that separates infested regions, where suppression activities prevail, from largely uninfested regions, where eradication activities prevail.

(c) "Suppression" which means reducing the vigor of noxious weed populations within an infested region, decreasing the propensity of noxious weed species to spread to surrounding lands, and mitigating the negative effects of noxious weed populations on infested lands. Suppression efforts may employ a wide variety of integrated management techniques.

(d) "Restoration" which means the removal of noxious weed species and reestablishment of desirable plant communities on lands of significant environmental or agricultural value in order to help restore or maintain said value.

(12) "Management plan" means the noxious weed management plan developed by any person or the local advisory board using integrated management.

(13) (Deleted by amendment, L. 96, p. 764, § 5, effective May 23, 1996.)

(14) "Municipality" has the meaning set forth in section 31-1-101 (6), C.R.S.

(15) "Native plant" means a plant species that is indigenous to the state of Colorado.

(16) "Noxious weed" means an alien plant or parts of an alien plant that have been designated by rule as being noxious or has been declared a noxious weed by a local advisory board, and meets one or more of the following criteria:

(a) Aggressively invades or is detrimental to economic crops or native plant communities;

(b) Is poisonous to livestock;

(c) Is a carrier of detrimental insects, diseases, or parasites;

(d) The direct or indirect effect of the presence of this plant is detrimental to the environmentally sound management of natural or agricultural ecosystems.

(16.2) "Noxious weed management" means the planning and implementation of an integrated program to manage noxious weed species.

(17) "Person" or "occupant" means an individual, partnership, corporation, association, or federal, state, or local government or agency thereof owning, occupying, or controlling any land, easement, or right-of-way, including any city, county, state, or federally owned and controlled highway, drainage or irrigation ditch, spoil bank, borrow pit, gas and oil pipeline, high voltage electrical transmission line, or right-of-way for a canal or lateral.

(18) "Plant growth regulator" means a substance used for controlling or modifying plant growth processes without appreciable phytotoxic effect at the dosage applied.

(18.5) "State noxious weed" means any noxious weed identified by the commissioner by rule after notifying and consulting with the state noxious weed advisory committee created in section 35-5.5-108.7.

(18.6) "State weed coordinator" means the state weed coordinator under contract with or appointed by the commissioner pursuant to section 35-5.5-117.

(19) and (20) (Deleted by amendment, L. 96, p. 764, § 5, effective May 23, 1996.)

(21) "Weed" means any undesirable plant.