PA officials express concern over emerald ash borer
By Michael Pound, TimesOnline.com
The bugs are back.
Actually, the emerald ash borer, an invasive beetle that made its Pennsylvania debut last summer in Cranberry Township, hasn’t gone anywhere; in fact, officials at the state Department of Agriculture are hoping against hope that the infestation hasn’t already spread too far through the state.
As warm weather approaches, expect more discussion of the bug, the quarantine that limits movement of ash trees and products made from its wood and the statewide ban on the importation of firewood into Pennsylvania. Also, expect to see more of the surveys that located the critter along Route 19 in Cranberry last June.
The emerald ash borer — a shiny green dime-sized beetle — is a native of Asia, and probably arrived in the United States years ago after hitching a ride in wooden shipping crates. It was first discovered in this country in 2002 near Detroit, although agriculture officials there estimate it had arrived as much as 10 years prior to its discovery.
That head-start there has turned into a huge problem. The bug’s larvae — which bore through ash trees until they become adults — have killed more than 30 million ash trees in southeastern Michigan alone, and killed millions more in Ohio and Indiana.
During its normal life, an emerald ash borer doesn’t travel far on its own, but it has spread as people move ash trees products made with ash or ash firewood from infested areas. That’s why seven states — Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Ohio and West Virginia — all have imposed some kind of ban on the movement of ash wood products or firewood in hopes of stopping the spread.
The bug was discovered here in late June, as a team of state agriculture department surveyors moved through Cranberry Township. The state imposed a quarantine on movement of all ash wood products and all firewood from four counties — Beaver, Butler, Allegheny and Lawrence — just days after the discovery.
One month later, the state banned the importation of all hardwood firewood from outside the state. There are fines associated with violating either of the quarantines.
The infestation has the attention of Pennsylvania U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, who this week introduced legislation that would require an inventory of possible invasive species each time the United States enters into a new international trade agreement.
The Agriculture Smart Trade Act, which Casey is co-sponsoring with Sen. Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, would force the president to submit a report to Congress detailing the possible invasive species, what impact they could have if they reached the United States and plans and estimated costs for fighting an infestation.
“Increased international trade means an increased risk of importing bugs and diseases that can have devastating effects,” Casey said. “This bill will help acknowledge the risk and put in place the best safeguards so that we can prevent the accidental introduction of these harmful pests.” Full Article
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New Jersey anglers, boaters warned of didymo
By Todd B. Bates, APP.com
Seen any rock snot lately? Don't laugh. This highly invasive form of freshwater algae can smother stream beds, threatening fish and other aquatic life.
And it could spread to New Jersey. State officials want anglers, boaters and other water users to block a potential rock snot invasion by cleaning boats, fishing gear and other equipment.
"We're concerned, but I don't know if we're alarmed yet," said Duane Lloyd of Brick, a member and former president of the Jersey Shore Chapter of Trout Unlimited, a nonprofit group. He wishes that rock snot had "a different name," he added.
The state Department of Environmental Protection recently issued a warning about rock snot and recommendations on how to keep it from spreading. The algae, which can form thick mats on stream bottoms, have yet to be spotted in New Jersey, according to officials and fishermen.
But New York state officials found it in the East and West Branches of the Delaware River last year and the Batten Kill in 2006, according to e-mails from Alexander J. Smith, a research scientist in the New York state Department of Environmental Conservation.
"Vermont has verified its presence in several other rivers as well," a Smith e-mail says. "The potential for spread to N.J. is very real provided there are river users that recreate in infected waters of N.Y. and then travel to N.J. waters without first following the necessary equipment cleaning procedures."
To avoid spreading rock snot to a new stream or river, people should clean all equipment such as waders, clothing, boats, fishing gear and any other object that has been in contact with the water before they go to a new site, according to the DEP Web site.
"Porous materials such as neoprene waders and felt soles used by wading anglers are prime suspects in the spread of (rock snot) among streams," according to the New York state Department of Environmental Conservation Web site.
Once rock snot affects a waterway, it can't be eliminated, according to a fact sheet by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Federation of Fly Fishers on the Web. "Infection may only need a single cell," the fact sheet says.
Rock snot is the nickname for a microscopic freshwater diatom — a type of algae — dubbed Didymosphenia geminata, or didymo for short. It is found in streams and rivers in much of North America, attaching itself to stream beds by a stalk, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Web site.
Generally drab in color, it can be light gray, brown, white or pale yellow, the DEP Web site says.
Didymo forms large mats closely resembling algae blooms or long streams that look similar to toilet paper, the Web site says. Full Article
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Sudden oak death pathogen is evolving, says new study
By Sarah Yang, UC Berkeley News
BERKELEY – The pathogen responsible for Sudden Oak Death first got its grip in California's forests outside a nursery in Santa Cruz and at Mt. Tamalpais in Marin County before spreading out to eventually kill millions of oaks and tanoaks along the Pacific Coast, according to a new study led by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley. It provides, for the first time, evidence of how the epidemic unfolded in this state.
"In this paper, we actually reconstruct the Sudden Oak Death epidemic," said Matteo Garbelotto, UC Berkeley associate extension specialist and adjunct professor, and principal investigator of the study. "We point to where the disease was introduced in the wild and where it spread from those introduction points."
The study, scheduled to appear later this month in the online early edition of the journal Molecular Ecology, also shows that the pathogen is currently evolving in California, with mutant genotypes appearing as new areas are infested. These findings suggest that movement of infected plants between different regions where Sudden Oak Death is established should be minimized, said Garbelotto. Full Article
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University of Florida researchers seek bugs to battle hygrophila
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Years of hydrilla control efforts have paid off for some Florida communities — unfortunately, their success has benefited a more troublesome aquatic weed, a University of Floriday expert says.
For the past decade Hygrophila polysperma — a southern Asian plant known as “hygrophila” for short — has been taking over the ecological niche left when hydrilla was eradicated from waterways, said Jim Cuda, a UF associate professor of of entomology. It’s now a significant problem in South and Central Florida.
Like hydrilla, hygrophila (“high-GRAW-fill-uh”) was sold as an aquarium plant, got into Florida waters decades ago and survived. But the similarities end there.
Hydrilla is strictly a water weed, and can be controlled with herbicides, hungry grass carp or mechanical harvesting. Hygrophila can grow fully submerged or up on river banks. Herbicides aren’t very effective, grass carp don’t like it, and mechanical harvesting breaks its stems into tiny pieces capable of spawning new plants.
Given that scenario, Cuda and colleagues with UF's Insitutue of Food and Agricultural Sciences are looking for natural enemies that attack the plant on its home turf in India.
‘There aren’t any good, cost-effective management options for hygrophila,” Cuda said. “That’s why there’s interest in biological control.”
Last fall, Cuda and entomology graduate student Abhishek Mukherjee made a collecting trip to several Indian states, described in an article published in the spring issue of Aquatics, journal of the Florida Aquatic Plant Management Society.
The researchers found evidence of at least one insect Mukherjee hopes to capture on a return trip this summer. They also collected samples of wild hygrophila that are being genetically analyzed to determine if they’re identical to plants found in Florida.
If so, that would mean insects and diseases found in the same parts of India would be likely to attack the Florida hygrophila. If not, the researchers may keep trying to pinpoint the original home of Florida hygrophila and seek enemies there.
The UF team — which includes Cuda, Mukherjee and Bill Overholt, also a UF associate professor of entomology — recently discovered that the larvae of a native moth species will feed on hygrophila. The moth has no value as a biological control agent because it isn’t host-specific — the larvae attack more than 60 plants — and is unlikely to put a dent in hygrophila populations. But it can be a great research tool, enabling researchers to find out if hygrophila can survive defoliation, Cuda said.
In the United States, hygrophila is currently growing wild only in Florida and Texas. It’s been officially confirmed in 10 Florida counties, though Cuda suspects it’s present in at least 20. Previous research indicates the weed can survive cold climates, and could potentially spread as far as hydrilla did — from Delaware to Florida, all along the Gulf Coast, and north to Washington state. Full Article
Monday, April 28, 2008
Monday, April 21, 2008
Week of April 20, 2008
Updated April 25
U.S. House passes ballast water treatment standards
By Jeff Alexander, Muskegon Chronicle
The battle to keep ocean freighters from dumping more foreign species into the Great Lakes made an historic advance Wednesday, when one branch of Congress passed the nation's first ballast water treatment standards.
On a vote of 395-7, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a Coast Guard funding bill (H.R. 2830) that contained language requiring some freighters to disinfect ballast water tanks beginning next year. By 2015, all ships operating in the Great Lakes must have treatment systems on-board that kill all living organisms in ballast tanks, including pathogens.
The bill now goes to the U.S. Senate, which has been debating similar legislation (S. 1892). If approved by the Senate and signed into law by President Bush, the legislation would enact the world's most stringent ballast water treatment standards. Full Article
The full text of the bill can be found at
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-2830
----------------------------------------------------------
Adirondack Park Invasive Plant Program (APIPP) releases 2007 annual report and 2008 workplan
APIPP is pleased to announce that our 2007 Annual Report and 2008 Workplan are now available online at http://adkinvasives.com/publications.html .
In addition, the Adirondack Aquatic Nuisance Species Committee produced its 2007 summary report and 2008 Workplan, also available on APIPP's website under the heading: Adirondack Park Aquatic Nuisance Species Management Plan, http://adkinvasives.com/Aquatic/Resources/Resources.html .
--------------------------------------------------------
Conservationists, biologists, battle unwelcome species to save Delaware plants
The daffodils are blooming along the banks of Hickory Run, a small tributary of Red Clay Creek.
The only trouble is, they don't belong here.
Daffodils -- like the multiflora rose, the seedlings of Japanese stilt grass and the low-growing garlic mustard -- are invaders in this sylvan setting.
"We'll never get rid of 'em," said James G. Subach, natural lands supervisor for the Mount Cuba Center in Greenville.
Besides habitat loss, many private and public land managers in Delaware believe the spread of invasive species -- especially invasive plants -- is one of the state's biggest environmental
challenges.
They often out-compete native varieties.
Barry Rice, an invasive-species scientist for The Nature Conservancy, said they typically share characteristics such as a short period from germination to reproduction, produce many seeds and can reproduce both by seeds or vegetatively. In addition, they typically take root in disturbed habitats such as roadsides. Once established at the edge of a road or forest, they easily spread, either on passing vehicles or in the wind drafts from passing cars and trucks, he said.
The impact from invasive plants spreads throughout an ecosystem, according to Douglas W. Tallamy, professor and chairman of the University of Delaware Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology, affecting biodiversity on every level from plant composition to insects to birds that rely on insects to feed their young.
While it is a challenge, Tallamy said, it is also an area where individual Delawareans can make a difference.
Big environmental issues like global warming often leave people thinking "whatever we personally do isn't going to make a measurable difference," he said. But with invasive plants, people can make a difference one plant at a time and one backyard at a time.
In a state like Delaware, with less and less undeveloped habitat and with fragments of forest, Tallamy believes there is an alternative: "What we need to do is redesign suburbia."
Because non-native plants often are sold in garden centers, homeowners may plant them without realizing the impact.
In his new book, "Bringing Nature Home," Tallamy wrote that habitat loss and fragmentation from farming and development have taken a toll on native plant and animal communities. Ultimately, he said, there will be no habitat left except for the landscapes and gardens we create.
By getting rid of non-natives in yards throughout suburbia, replacing them with native plants and getting neighbor after neighbor to do the same, you end up with a connected area for wildlife and better biodiversity.
Tallamy knows firsthand what a difference native plants can make. In 2000, he and his wife bought 10 acres in southeastern Pennsylvania. Over time, they removed non-natives and replaced them with native species.
Every year, he said, they can see a difference in the native insects and birds they attract.
Susan Barton, a cooperative extension agent at the Univesity of Delaware and co-author of two booklets on plants for a Livable Delaware, said a transportation department that can remove all the invasive plants along highway rights of way may seem impossible.
"But removing multiflora rose from each person's property isn't incomprehensible," she said. Then, "we'd have habitat in suburbia."
Controlling invasives can be complicated. Subach said it often is most important to understand the life cycle of individual plant species to best time control efforts.
Along Delaware's coastal marshes, where an invasive, giant reed species called Phragmites australis is a concern, control efforts can take years. First, specialized weed killers that can be used near environmentally sensitive waterways are sprayed on the vast stands of weeds. Spray is typically applied over two seasons. The spray is followed by a controlled burn of the reeds.
On Wednesday, firefighters in Lewes did a controlled burn on invasive phragmites at Lewes Beach. Besides being a fire hazard, the invasive species of the reed provides little habitat value in North America.
In 2002, a team of researchers found that Phragmites australis supported 170 species in its native habitat. It is found in Europe, Asia and Africa and researchers here believe there are two varieties in our salt marshes -- one that was introduced more than 300 years ago and is especially invasive and a second variety that is native to North America. The introduced variety provides habitat for five species.
In 2002, state environmental officials estimated the total cost of a state-landowner cost-share program to control phragmites at $168,700. A total of 2,410 acres were sprayed -- a small part of the affected area throughout the state. Nationally, federal officials estimate the cost of controlling all invasive species at $138 billion a year. Full Article
---------------------------------------------------------
Bullhog vs. Honeysuckle
By Steve Bennish, Dayton Daily News
Montgomery County, Ohio — Honeysuckle, meet thy doom.
Your killer is a 6-ton Bullhog forestry mulching machine its friends at Five Rivers MetroParks fondly call a "Bobcat on steroids."
The last thing you will see, honeysuckle, on your way to being ground into mulch, are six rows of steel teeth whirling around at 2,400 rpm on the front of a machine that travels on steel tracks.
This well-deserved fate has been long in coming for honeysuckle, the green Godzilla of the southwestern Ohio woods.
It's a nonnative invasive plant that overwhelms and destroys native plant life, from valuable oak trees to expensive exported herbs such as ginseng. Conservationists, for good reason, despise honeysuckle, which has taken over park lands and private woodlots. Some would like to ban its sale in Ohio.
Honeysuckle has been difficult to destroy — until now.
At Possum Creek MetroParks this week, conservation biologist apprentice Bryan Dorsey made quick work of several acres along Frytown Road, easily grinding plants up to 20 inches in diameter. This stuff has been growing since the 1960s and it is well established.
The new machine, purchased for $93,000 by MetroParks from FECON Inc. in Lebanon, arrived for service March 28.
It is the only one in possession of a parks organization in these parts.
The Bullhog takes out an acre of honeysuckle in six hours — three times faster than a human crew using chain saws. It's cost-effective and sparing of other plant life, MetroParks officials said.
The Bullhog also works on buckthorn, autumn olive and ailanthus. MetroParks plans to use the machine on honeysuckle from November through April, stopping for bird nesting season.
Between honeysuckle session, the machine will be used for other purposes.
After the honeysuckle is shredded, stumps are sprayed with a herbicide, Dorsey said, in a routine that will have to be repeated because honeysuckle requires regular suppression and FiveRivers has hundreds of acres that need attention.
FECON sells many of its locally assembled machines for maintenance along highways and land clearing, product manager Anthony Nikodym said.
---------------------------------------------------------
Pesticide ban has parks department eyeing options
By Meredith Blake
Greenwich, Connecticut - The Department of Parks and Recreation is scrambling to come up with a plan to properly treat the town's athletic fields following a ban on pesticides instituted last week.
The department had anticipated the ban, but did not expect it until June 2009, when a state law banning the use of pesticides on all elementary and middle school grounds was set to go into effect. Not only did the town mandate go into effect a year earlier, but it also included all town, school and park athletic fields.
The department did not allocate funds to treat the fields organically, nor does it have the equipment and personnel for the job, according to Tim Coughlin, turf operation manager for the parks department. "This is a major logistical change," he said.
In the past, the department has applied one application of pesticide to prevent crabgrass, an invasive weed that, if not controlled, can smother regular grass and destroy the fields.
Now it needs to use equipment to overseed, fertilize, irrigate the fields, and get people out to attack the weeds. And it must be done now, Coughlin said, before the grass really starts to grow in May and the fields are used daily for baseball and other sports games.
"We can't wait too long. Things need to be done in April," said Bruce Spaman, town tree warden.
Spaman, a member of the Environmental Action Task Force, the newly formed group that proposed the ban, said they pushed for its quick implementation, seeing it as an opportunity
"Basically, the program was heading in that direction, but this was the push we needed to go with the organic program," Spaman said. Additional money will be needed, but it is an investment, he said.
If residents look to the successful field at North Street School, which is a model for the rest of the town, they will see what the fields will become. They won't look like Yankee Stadium just yet, he said.
Right now they are going to have to work harder to monitor and treat the fields and that will cost money, he added.
"We know how to do it, but the question is where does the money come from," Coughlin said. Coughlin will be meeting next week with Joseph Siciliano, director of parks and recreation, to come up with a plan. Full Article
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Spread of cogon grass heightens risk of major fire in South Carolina
By KATRINA A. GOGGINS, The Associated Press
COLUMBIA - An invasive weed that already has infested more than 1 million acres nationwide continues to spread across the parched Southeast, and experts say the regions drought makes the highly flammable intruder more threatening than ever.
Cogon grass, known for its fluffy, silvery white seed heads, has coaxed its way into gardens, forests and highway medians across the region, where control and eradication programs have kicked into high gear.
Dont buy it, dont dig it up, dont plant it and just let somebody know if you see it, said Laurie Reid, forest health specialist for the South Carolina Forestry Commission. We are definitely on the lookout for it because if it happens to come into a forested situation, then thats when the danger really comes for either wildfire or a prescribed burn.
Now in its flowering stage, cogon grass can burn all year and when it catches fire, experts say it burns higher and hotter than regular grass during wildfires. Its most flammable in colder months when it appears as a tall, thick mass of brown-colored grass. But drought conditions in the Southeast have kept the weed dry and increased its risk as a fire hazard this spring, experts say.
They are unusually hot-burning fires that consume at higher heights -- up to 10 to 15feet, said Jim Miller, a regional invasive plant scientist with federal Agriculture Department. "I dont think theres anything more flammable in our environments landscape. I dont know anything that burns as hot in our ecosystem as cogon grass."
Once used as packing material that arrived in Mobile, Ala. on ships in 1912, cogon grass can seem harmless even beautiful but forestry experts in South Carolina, Georgia, Florida and Alabama warn its a killer.
A native of southeastern Asia, cogon grass chokes all competing vegetation it kills off pine seedlings in forests and overtakes grazing land where most animals wont give it a second look because of its saw-toothed leaves. Experts believe the aggressive weed could turn the region into a grassy savannah devoid of all native species if given enough time. Ironically, forestry experts said, the grass has spread in part because its hitched rides on equipment used to fight forest fires.
Its actually got to epidemic proportions, said Ed Brown, a spokesman for the Mississippi Forestry Commission. I call it a super weed. I have seen it grow on some of the driest sites that wouldnt hardly grow anything and Ive seen it growing down the edge of water. Ive actually seen it taking over a patch of kudzu.
Cogon grass, sometimes spelled cogongrass, is on every continent except Antarctica and inhabits around 1.2 billion acres worldwide. Asia has lost about 500 million acres to the weed, and it continues to spread to an additional 370,000 acres each year, experts say.
Its definitely a worldwide problem and now we are a part of that worldwide problem in the Southeast because we have failed to confront it, Miller said. Florida now has over 1 million acres and Miller said hes heard reports of cogon grass causing intense home fires there. Alabama has 60,000 acres of it; South Carolina only 10, so far, according to estimates done by the USDA and Clemson University.
States, with the help of a federal grant awarded last year, are starting to coordinate efforts to study, survey and control the spread of cogon grass. Clemson University scientists plan to survey more than half of South Carolina next month. Full Article
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Invasive plant in creek hinders manatees
Zac Anderson, HeraldTribune.com
NORTH PORT, Florida — A popular winter home for West Indian Manatees in Sarasota County has become so choked with debris that the endangered animals are struggling to access the creek.
The problem should be remedied soon though, thanks to a $32,000 grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department.
Sarasota County plans to use the money to remove invasive Brazilian pepper trees, which shed their limbs so rapidly that they dam up the Salt Creek in North Port.
The creek, a tributary of the Myakka River, annually hosts up to 70 manatees, which move from the Gulf of Mexico to warm inland waters during the winter.
"This is a critical habitat for the Manatees and the vegetative dams limit their ability to move," said Michael Elswick, an environmental specialist with the county.
Brazilian Pepper trees grow much faster, and shed their leaves and branches more quickly, than native mangroves and pine trees, Elswick said.
"The trees generate a lot of biomass that has heavily impaired the area," Elswick said.
The county plans to replace invasive trees with native plants along a section of the creek popular with manatees. Work with begin on May 31 and last throughout the summer. Article
----------------------------------------------------------
U.S. House passes ballast water treatment standards
By Jeff Alexander, Muskegon Chronicle
The battle to keep ocean freighters from dumping more foreign species into the Great Lakes made an historic advance Wednesday, when one branch of Congress passed the nation's first ballast water treatment standards.
On a vote of 395-7, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a Coast Guard funding bill (H.R. 2830) that contained language requiring some freighters to disinfect ballast water tanks beginning next year. By 2015, all ships operating in the Great Lakes must have treatment systems on-board that kill all living organisms in ballast tanks, including pathogens.
The bill now goes to the U.S. Senate, which has been debating similar legislation (S. 1892). If approved by the Senate and signed into law by President Bush, the legislation would enact the world's most stringent ballast water treatment standards. Full Article
The full text of the bill can be found at
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-2830
----------------------------------------------------------
Adirondack Park Invasive Plant Program (APIPP) releases 2007 annual report and 2008 workplan
APIPP is pleased to announce that our 2007 Annual Report and 2008 Workplan are now available online at http://adkinvasives.com/publications.html .
In addition, the Adirondack Aquatic Nuisance Species Committee produced its 2007 summary report and 2008 Workplan, also available on APIPP's website under the heading: Adirondack Park Aquatic Nuisance Species Management Plan, http://adkinvasives.com/Aquatic/Resources/Resources.html .
--------------------------------------------------------
Conservationists, biologists, battle unwelcome species to save Delaware plants
The daffodils are blooming along the banks of Hickory Run, a small tributary of Red Clay Creek.
The only trouble is, they don't belong here.
Daffodils -- like the multiflora rose, the seedlings of Japanese stilt grass and the low-growing garlic mustard -- are invaders in this sylvan setting.
"We'll never get rid of 'em," said James G. Subach, natural lands supervisor for the Mount Cuba Center in Greenville.
Besides habitat loss, many private and public land managers in Delaware believe the spread of invasive species -- especially invasive plants -- is one of the state's biggest environmental
challenges.
They often out-compete native varieties.
Barry Rice, an invasive-species scientist for The Nature Conservancy, said they typically share characteristics such as a short period from germination to reproduction, produce many seeds and can reproduce both by seeds or vegetatively. In addition, they typically take root in disturbed habitats such as roadsides. Once established at the edge of a road or forest, they easily spread, either on passing vehicles or in the wind drafts from passing cars and trucks, he said.
The impact from invasive plants spreads throughout an ecosystem, according to Douglas W. Tallamy, professor and chairman of the University of Delaware Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology, affecting biodiversity on every level from plant composition to insects to birds that rely on insects to feed their young.
While it is a challenge, Tallamy said, it is also an area where individual Delawareans can make a difference.
Big environmental issues like global warming often leave people thinking "whatever we personally do isn't going to make a measurable difference," he said. But with invasive plants, people can make a difference one plant at a time and one backyard at a time.
In a state like Delaware, with less and less undeveloped habitat and with fragments of forest, Tallamy believes there is an alternative: "What we need to do is redesign suburbia."
Because non-native plants often are sold in garden centers, homeowners may plant them without realizing the impact.
In his new book, "Bringing Nature Home," Tallamy wrote that habitat loss and fragmentation from farming and development have taken a toll on native plant and animal communities. Ultimately, he said, there will be no habitat left except for the landscapes and gardens we create.
By getting rid of non-natives in yards throughout suburbia, replacing them with native plants and getting neighbor after neighbor to do the same, you end up with a connected area for wildlife and better biodiversity.
Tallamy knows firsthand what a difference native plants can make. In 2000, he and his wife bought 10 acres in southeastern Pennsylvania. Over time, they removed non-natives and replaced them with native species.
Every year, he said, they can see a difference in the native insects and birds they attract.
Susan Barton, a cooperative extension agent at the Univesity of Delaware and co-author of two booklets on plants for a Livable Delaware, said a transportation department that can remove all the invasive plants along highway rights of way may seem impossible.
"But removing multiflora rose from each person's property isn't incomprehensible," she said. Then, "we'd have habitat in suburbia."
Controlling invasives can be complicated. Subach said it often is most important to understand the life cycle of individual plant species to best time control efforts.
Along Delaware's coastal marshes, where an invasive, giant reed species called Phragmites australis is a concern, control efforts can take years. First, specialized weed killers that can be used near environmentally sensitive waterways are sprayed on the vast stands of weeds. Spray is typically applied over two seasons. The spray is followed by a controlled burn of the reeds.
On Wednesday, firefighters in Lewes did a controlled burn on invasive phragmites at Lewes Beach. Besides being a fire hazard, the invasive species of the reed provides little habitat value in North America.
In 2002, a team of researchers found that Phragmites australis supported 170 species in its native habitat. It is found in Europe, Asia and Africa and researchers here believe there are two varieties in our salt marshes -- one that was introduced more than 300 years ago and is especially invasive and a second variety that is native to North America. The introduced variety provides habitat for five species.
In 2002, state environmental officials estimated the total cost of a state-landowner cost-share program to control phragmites at $168,700. A total of 2,410 acres were sprayed -- a small part of the affected area throughout the state. Nationally, federal officials estimate the cost of controlling all invasive species at $138 billion a year. Full Article
---------------------------------------------------------
Bullhog vs. Honeysuckle
By Steve Bennish, Dayton Daily News
Montgomery County, Ohio — Honeysuckle, meet thy doom.
Your killer is a 6-ton Bullhog forestry mulching machine its friends at Five Rivers MetroParks fondly call a "Bobcat on steroids."
The last thing you will see, honeysuckle, on your way to being ground into mulch, are six rows of steel teeth whirling around at 2,400 rpm on the front of a machine that travels on steel tracks.
This well-deserved fate has been long in coming for honeysuckle, the green Godzilla of the southwestern Ohio woods.
It's a nonnative invasive plant that overwhelms and destroys native plant life, from valuable oak trees to expensive exported herbs such as ginseng. Conservationists, for good reason, despise honeysuckle, which has taken over park lands and private woodlots. Some would like to ban its sale in Ohio.
Honeysuckle has been difficult to destroy — until now.
At Possum Creek MetroParks this week, conservation biologist apprentice Bryan Dorsey made quick work of several acres along Frytown Road, easily grinding plants up to 20 inches in diameter. This stuff has been growing since the 1960s and it is well established.
The new machine, purchased for $93,000 by MetroParks from FECON Inc. in Lebanon, arrived for service March 28.
It is the only one in possession of a parks organization in these parts.
The Bullhog takes out an acre of honeysuckle in six hours — three times faster than a human crew using chain saws. It's cost-effective and sparing of other plant life, MetroParks officials said.
The Bullhog also works on buckthorn, autumn olive and ailanthus. MetroParks plans to use the machine on honeysuckle from November through April, stopping for bird nesting season.
Between honeysuckle session, the machine will be used for other purposes.
After the honeysuckle is shredded, stumps are sprayed with a herbicide, Dorsey said, in a routine that will have to be repeated because honeysuckle requires regular suppression and FiveRivers has hundreds of acres that need attention.
FECON sells many of its locally assembled machines for maintenance along highways and land clearing, product manager Anthony Nikodym said.
---------------------------------------------------------
Pesticide ban has parks department eyeing options
By Meredith Blake
Greenwich, Connecticut - The Department of Parks and Recreation is scrambling to come up with a plan to properly treat the town's athletic fields following a ban on pesticides instituted last week.
The department had anticipated the ban, but did not expect it until June 2009, when a state law banning the use of pesticides on all elementary and middle school grounds was set to go into effect. Not only did the town mandate go into effect a year earlier, but it also included all town, school and park athletic fields.
The department did not allocate funds to treat the fields organically, nor does it have the equipment and personnel for the job, according to Tim Coughlin, turf operation manager for the parks department. "This is a major logistical change," he said.
In the past, the department has applied one application of pesticide to prevent crabgrass, an invasive weed that, if not controlled, can smother regular grass and destroy the fields.
Now it needs to use equipment to overseed, fertilize, irrigate the fields, and get people out to attack the weeds. And it must be done now, Coughlin said, before the grass really starts to grow in May and the fields are used daily for baseball and other sports games.
"We can't wait too long. Things need to be done in April," said Bruce Spaman, town tree warden.
Spaman, a member of the Environmental Action Task Force, the newly formed group that proposed the ban, said they pushed for its quick implementation, seeing it as an opportunity
"Basically, the program was heading in that direction, but this was the push we needed to go with the organic program," Spaman said. Additional money will be needed, but it is an investment, he said.
If residents look to the successful field at North Street School, which is a model for the rest of the town, they will see what the fields will become. They won't look like Yankee Stadium just yet, he said.
Right now they are going to have to work harder to monitor and treat the fields and that will cost money, he added.
"We know how to do it, but the question is where does the money come from," Coughlin said. Coughlin will be meeting next week with Joseph Siciliano, director of parks and recreation, to come up with a plan. Full Article
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Spread of cogon grass heightens risk of major fire in South Carolina
By KATRINA A. GOGGINS, The Associated Press
COLUMBIA - An invasive weed that already has infested more than 1 million acres nationwide continues to spread across the parched Southeast, and experts say the regions drought makes the highly flammable intruder more threatening than ever.
Cogon grass, known for its fluffy, silvery white seed heads, has coaxed its way into gardens, forests and highway medians across the region, where control and eradication programs have kicked into high gear.
Dont buy it, dont dig it up, dont plant it and just let somebody know if you see it, said Laurie Reid, forest health specialist for the South Carolina Forestry Commission. We are definitely on the lookout for it because if it happens to come into a forested situation, then thats when the danger really comes for either wildfire or a prescribed burn.
Now in its flowering stage, cogon grass can burn all year and when it catches fire, experts say it burns higher and hotter than regular grass during wildfires. Its most flammable in colder months when it appears as a tall, thick mass of brown-colored grass. But drought conditions in the Southeast have kept the weed dry and increased its risk as a fire hazard this spring, experts say.
They are unusually hot-burning fires that consume at higher heights -- up to 10 to 15feet, said Jim Miller, a regional invasive plant scientist with federal Agriculture Department. "I dont think theres anything more flammable in our environments landscape. I dont know anything that burns as hot in our ecosystem as cogon grass."
Once used as packing material that arrived in Mobile, Ala. on ships in 1912, cogon grass can seem harmless even beautiful but forestry experts in South Carolina, Georgia, Florida and Alabama warn its a killer.
A native of southeastern Asia, cogon grass chokes all competing vegetation it kills off pine seedlings in forests and overtakes grazing land where most animals wont give it a second look because of its saw-toothed leaves. Experts believe the aggressive weed could turn the region into a grassy savannah devoid of all native species if given enough time. Ironically, forestry experts said, the grass has spread in part because its hitched rides on equipment used to fight forest fires.
Its actually got to epidemic proportions, said Ed Brown, a spokesman for the Mississippi Forestry Commission. I call it a super weed. I have seen it grow on some of the driest sites that wouldnt hardly grow anything and Ive seen it growing down the edge of water. Ive actually seen it taking over a patch of kudzu.
Cogon grass, sometimes spelled cogongrass, is on every continent except Antarctica and inhabits around 1.2 billion acres worldwide. Asia has lost about 500 million acres to the weed, and it continues to spread to an additional 370,000 acres each year, experts say.
Its definitely a worldwide problem and now we are a part of that worldwide problem in the Southeast because we have failed to confront it, Miller said. Florida now has over 1 million acres and Miller said hes heard reports of cogon grass causing intense home fires there. Alabama has 60,000 acres of it; South Carolina only 10, so far, according to estimates done by the USDA and Clemson University.
States, with the help of a federal grant awarded last year, are starting to coordinate efforts to study, survey and control the spread of cogon grass. Clemson University scientists plan to survey more than half of South Carolina next month. Full Article
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Invasive plant in creek hinders manatees
Zac Anderson, HeraldTribune.com
NORTH PORT, Florida — A popular winter home for West Indian Manatees in Sarasota County has become so choked with debris that the endangered animals are struggling to access the creek.
The problem should be remedied soon though, thanks to a $32,000 grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department.
Sarasota County plans to use the money to remove invasive Brazilian pepper trees, which shed their limbs so rapidly that they dam up the Salt Creek in North Port.
The creek, a tributary of the Myakka River, annually hosts up to 70 manatees, which move from the Gulf of Mexico to warm inland waters during the winter.
"This is a critical habitat for the Manatees and the vegetative dams limit their ability to move," said Michael Elswick, an environmental specialist with the county.
Brazilian Pepper trees grow much faster, and shed their leaves and branches more quickly, than native mangroves and pine trees, Elswick said.
"The trees generate a lot of biomass that has heavily impaired the area," Elswick said.
The county plans to replace invasive trees with native plants along a section of the creek popular with manatees. Work with begin on May 31 and last throughout the summer. Article
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