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UT's Daniel Simberloff studies the effects of exotic plants and animals that destroy native species.
Invasive species intrigue Daniel Simberloff, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at UT. Some 7000 exotic species have been introduced into the 48 contiguous United States. About 700 of these are considered invasive, because they destroy native species. For example, ladybugs native to the United States are being replaced by exotic ladybugs from Asia and Europe. "Dozens of native species here are rare, but introduced species are common," Simberloff says. Another example is the Small Indian Mongoose, which sugar cane growers introduced to the West Indies in 1872, to Hawaii and Fiji in 1982, and later to islands in the Indian Ocean and Adriatic Sea. Brought in to control rats, the mongoose "turned out to be a huge pest," Simberloff says. "It caused the extinction of more than 30 species of birds, mammals, reptiles, and amphibians native to these islands. "Most introduced species do not become a major problem, but some do. And so we ask, 'Why?' You add a new species to a group that has been co-adapting and co-evolving for a long time and suddenly you have a whole new entity in the mix. Studying its impact should tell us quite a bit about the forces that determine which species can coexist and how they accommodate one another." During his early years on the national board of the Nature Conservancy (1986 to 1997), Simberloff came to realize how serious were the societal and environmental problems caused by introduced species."As one of the few scientists on the board, I talked to many land stewards," he says. "It became clear over a three- or four-year period that about half their problems had to do with introduced species. That was when I began to see this as not just an interesting, arcane academic phenomenon, but a societal and economic concern."
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