Thu Apr 07 2005 - 17:12:14 PDT

Contents
1. Glyphosate resistant ragweed (Nebraska, USA)
2. Dimorphotheca sinuata (Southwest, USA)
3. Kalanchoe/Bryophyllum (Nationwide, USA)
4. Trailhead resources (Global, Planet Earth)
5. USF&WS list of non-native birds (Nationwide, USA)
6. CWMA Workshops (North America, USA)
7. Training contractors (Virginia, USA)
8. Marine Invasives Monitoring (Northeast coast, North America)
9. New study on Glyphosate toxicity (Global, Planet Earth)

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1. Glyphosate resistant ragweed (Nebraska, USA)
From: Chris Helzer (chelzer(at)tnc.org)

In case you had not seen it, a University of Missouri weed scientist (Reid
Smeda) has documented a 20-acre field in which common ragweed (Ambrosia
artemisiifolia) has shown itself to be resistant to 10 times the rate of
glyphosate that normally controls it. This makes the third weed that has
shown an incidence of resistance - and the first summer annual (the other
two are winter annuals - marestail and ryegrass). It was found in a field
with a history of continual soybean production and the repeated use of
glyphosate in glyphosate-resistant soybean varieties.
 
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2. Dimorphotheca sinuata (Southwest, USA)
From: Sandy Lloyd (slloyd(at)agric.wa.gov.au)

I am interested in info on Dimorphotheca sinuata as a weed, native to South
Africa, it has naturalized in California and Arizona. Is it mainly a weed of
roadsides and other highly disturbed areas?

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3. Kalanchoe/Bryophyllum (Nationwide, USA)
From: Arne Witt (witta(at)arc.agric.za)

I am looking for any information on Bryophyllum (Kalanchoe) in the wild. I
am struggling to find any information on the status of this plant in the
USA, i.e. Bryophyllum delagoense and B. pinnatum.

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4. Trailhead resources (Global, Planet Earth)
From: Bas Hargrove (bhargrove(at)tnc.org)

Tamarack Resort on West Mountain in western Idaho is interested in doing
some weed related education at hiking and mountain-biking trailheads. Are
there any good examples out there of educational signs targeted at
recreationists and their canine sidekicks? How about cleaning stations for
hikers, mountain bikers and dogs?

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5. USF&WS list of non-native birds (Nationwide, USA)
From: Jil Swearingen (jil_swearingen(at)nps.gov)

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today published in the Federal Register a
final list of the bird species to which the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA)
does not apply because they are not native to the United States and have
been introduced by humans everywhere they occur in the nation. The list is
required by the Migratory Bird Treaty Reform Act of 2004.

For more information see:
http://migratorybirds.fws.gov/

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6. CWMA Workshops (North America, USA)
From: Elizabeth Sklad (esklad(at)tnc.org)

If you are interested in learning more about forming and working with a
Cooperative Weed Management Area, check out the announcement in the link
below. The first three FREE workshops will be held in Wisconsin, Michigan,
and Vermont.

TNC has participated successfully in CWMAs, especially in the Western U.S.,
but they are less common in the Eastern U.S. Aside from a good working
relationship with neighboring landowners and a more strategic way of
managing invasive species, a few additional potential benefits to forming a
CWMA that I can see:

- Assuming that the Noxious Weed Control Act of 2004 gets some money
appropriated, it will be doled out to weed management "entities" like CWMAs
that apply for it
- The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation's Pulling Together Initiative
grant program often gives support money to groups that are starting or
expanding a CWMA. Also, you are more likely to get a PTI grant if you work
with Federal land managers in your area, especially within a CWMA.

http://www.fs.fed.us/r9/wildlife/nnis/cwma.pdf

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7. Training contractors (Virginia, USA)
From: Jennifer Allen (jennifer_allen(at)tnc.org)

We will be contracting herbicide application for garlic mustard in a
forested system, mainly along roads/trails and in some places, 50 to 150+
meters into the forest from the roads. If you work with contractors in a
similar situation, have the contractors quickly learned how to consistently
identify the invasive plant after a short training period? Once you have
guided contractors to your spray zone (e.g., 80-100 acres), have they
successfully been able to spray only the patches of your invasive target in
that spray zone (i.e., they spray where the invasive occurs, and not where
it doesn't!). The reason we ask this is because we are wondering about how
much hands-on management we will need for the contractor crew and how much
prep work is needed for delineating where the crew needs to spray. (We
have maps depicting the approximate boundaries or at least point occurrences
of each patch.)
 
The current plan is to have at least one TNC staff with the crew and to flag
the beginning/end of the spray zone where it intersects with road/trails.
We do not plan on flagging the extent of the mustard into the forest or each
patch within the spray zone. Contractors can walk from the road/trail into
the forest and spray until they see no more mustard. We have good luck on
quickly training unskilled volunteers on invasive plant identification, so
we are assuming that most contracting crews should be capable of
identification too. Is this a wrong assumption?

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8. Marine Invasives Monitoring (Northeast coast, North America)
From: David Delaney (david.delaney(at)elf.mcgill.ca)

This spring and summer, a pilot project (with the help of an MIT Sea Grant)
will be conducted for the monitoring of invasive crabs in the Northeast.
Next fall, after the efforts of citizen scientists is validated; the
monitoring will be expanded to all coastal states and marine invasive
organisms. Also my spread models and research will help to optimize how we
monitor and maximize our abilities with scarce resources of time and money
in any system, not just marine.

See: http://www.invasivetracers.com

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9. New study on Glyphosate toxicity (Global, Planet Earth)
From: Debra Nelson (dnelson(at)dnrmail.state.il.us)

(Debra forwarded an email with contributions from various weed scientists,
commenting on a recent study by a University of Pittsburgh biologist Rick
Relyea who found that applying RoundUp to a tank containing amphibians
killed them.)

Robert Szafoni noted: "It was very gratifying to see so many folks respond
to this with the correct observation that the researcher tested a herbicide
in a manner for which it is not listed - Round-up over water. The study
even noted that the surfactant was far more lethal to the amphibians than
the active ingredient. This is the second time in the last two years that a
"new" study showed herbicide impacts to amphibs by testing products in an
inappropriate manner. Bottom line...read and follow the label."

Debra Nelson noted: "There is good reason to be sure you use the "aquatic
approved" version of herbicides when applying around water!"