Invasive Plants Association of Wisconsin... Using a new type of remote sensing technology on aircraft to create a three-dimensional structure of more than 220,000 hectares of rain forest on the island of Hawaii ...
Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen says Wisconsin counties can enact their own ordinances to stop invasive species.
AG's ruling on local invasive plant ordinances (PDF, 431 KB)
August 14, 2007 -- Black Swallow-wort, a twining vine with dark purple star-shaped flowers, has recently been found in several locations in the Fort Atkinson area. This aggressive non-native vine can completely take over upland sites, strangling native trees and shrubs and cascading over flowers and grasses, blocking out the sunlight. More ...
Time, By CERI AU Friday, Jul. 13, 2007
If you thought composting your organic waste and planting greenery in your garden were enough to earn you a gold star in environmental responsibility, think again. Those sweet-smelling blooms in your backyard patch may brighten the yard, but they could actually be doing much more harm than good to the local ecosystem. ...CNN, POSTED: 12:48 p.m. EDT, March 23, 2007
Beloved by gardeners for its ability to camouflage an unsightly chain-link fence or cover ground where the sun barely shines, evergreen English ivy has long been a top-seller at nurseries. But this vine's vigorous growth habit has also earned it a more dubious distinction as an invasive plant species that will flagrantly cross into neighbors' yards and, when conditions are friendly, adjoining fields and forests, too. ...
by Kelly Kearns, WDNR Plant Conservation Program Manager, for Wisconsin Wetlands Association
Marsh invader reduces habitat, food and dries up creeks
MSNBC 10/18/07
An invasive marsh plant conquers leafy enemies with squirts of acid so toxic it disintegrates plant roots on contact, allowing for a toppling take-over. ...
Wisconsin Public Radio: June is Invasive Awareness Month in Wisconsin. On June 13th, 2007, Larry Meiller focused on invasive plants with UW-Madison Professor emeritus Jerry Doll, and D-N-R Invasive Plants Coordinator Tom Boos. On June 20th, Julia Solomon and Phil Moy will be discussing the topic of aquatic invasive species. Listen!
People, Land and Water, Science & Stewardship
Good plants and bad plants. Sometimes it is difficult to know the difference just by looking. This is true for butterflies and three plants in the mustard family that grow on lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management-Eastern States Milwaukee Field Office. ...
Wisconsin Natural Resources Magazine - June 2007
Practical advice and positive directions to recognize and minimize the consequences of invasive species. More ...
BURLINGTON, Vermont, February 27, 2007 (ENS) - A new study of reed canarygrass has led to the discovery of a novel mechanism that explains why some plant species become aggressive when introduced in new territory.
In its native European range, reed canarygrass does not push out other species or expanding its terrain. But, first introduced into the United States in the mid-19th century, it has run rampant, choking out native plants in wetlands. The grass is now considered an invasive pest in about ten states and its range is growing.
According to research published in the Feb. 27 edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences," the invasive power of this grass, comes not from any one individual plant, but from this history of multiple introductions from different regions of Europe.
Over decades, U.S. farmers and others have planted the grass as livestock feed, for erosion control, and for wastewater treatment, taking plants from places as far apart as France, the Czech Republic and Finland.
These multiple introductions, and subsequent interbreeding, create a kind of biological stacked deck, the researchers said. By drawing on genetic variety from across the European continent, new strains have emerged in the United States with higher genetic diversity and more potentially advantageous qualities than their species brethren across the Atlantic.
"It's not that you're taking the ones in France and moving them to the US and they're suddenly invasive," said study coauthor Jane Molofsky, associate professor of plant biology at the University of Vermont. "It's that you move some plants, and then you move some from somewhere else and they recombine here to form something better, genetic superstars."
This has significance far beyond the headache of reed canarygras, the researchers concluded, showing that invasive species can evolve extremely rapidly.
A nondescript grass discovered in the Oregon countryside is hardly an alien invasion. Yet the plant - a genetically modified form of a grass commonly grown on golf courses - is worrying the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) enough that it is running its first full environmental impact assessment of a GM plant. More ...
by Henry Fountain, NY Times, May 2, 2006
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Garlic mustard, a tall weed native to Europe that was introduced to the United States in the late 1800's, is a bit like that uninvited visitor. Researchers have found that it disrupts a healthy relationship between hardwood tree seedlings and soil fungi, with results that can be disastrous for a forest. ...
March 10, 2006 - Conventional wisdom says that invasive plants introduced to a foreign environment thrive because they don’t have natural enemies to keep them in check, but a new study suggests that’s not true.
(Janesville Gazette, Published Thursday, May 19, 2005 10:38:33 AM CDT) By Marcia Nelesen, Gazette Staff
It's right out of "Little Shop of Horrors."
Molly Farley recently pulled armloads of garlic mustard from the ravine in her backyard in the center of Janesville.
But she knew that mixing it into compost would only spread the seeds. And she didn't think the garbage collectors would pick up yard waste to put it in the landfill.
For lack of a better idea she loaded it in her wheelbarrow and stuck it in her cold, dark garage.
About two weeks later, the stuff was growing hardy and green right out of its own carcasses, just like something out of a science fiction movie.
This weed is practically invincible. ...
TRENTON, New Jersey, October 19, 2004 (ENS)
Gathering and preserving wildflowers and grasses is festive and easy.
by Barbara Estabrook, Wisconsin Natural Resources magazine, August 2004
now available for free downloading at the ELI online store.
ELI's (Environmental Law Institute) new research report offers a concise overview and evaluation of plant listing programs in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin. It explores the strengths and weaknesses of diverse state listing authorities, including traditional state noxious weed laws and newer programs specifically targeting invasive or exotic species.
Concrete conclusions and recommendations identify the characteristics that make listing programs most effective for preventing the introduction and spread of invasive species. We hope that lessons learned from this comparative study can assist your efforts to strengthen or reinvigorate invasive species programs in your states.
by Ron Seely
Biologists at UW-Madison have studied sites in a 1950s plant survey of Wisconsin's North Woods and found a changed world. ...
Wisconsin State Journal, June 9, 2004
Control of Purple Loosestrife Now a National 4-H Project
glin-announce, April 11, 2003