Missouri Landowners Asked to Beat Back Invasive Species

The current coordinator, fisheries biologist Tim Banek, who started in February, is making use of his year in the rotating assignment by working with landowners to advise them on trying to eradicate invasives on their lands.

Purple loosestrife may be decorative, but it is no help to wildlife. (Photo courtesyMissouri Botanical Garden)

Banek says he is enjoying the opportunity. "I did some invasive species work when I was a fisheries biologist," he said. "I had worked in fisheries for 20 years, and I wanted some new challenges. I thought this position would fit me well. I could learn a lot and make some contributions in a different way than in the past."

Banek points out that 97 percent of Missouri's land is privately owned. No matter what strides government agencies make in controlling invasives on public land, he says, they will fail if similar action does not take place on private land.

An invasive species is a plant or animal that is not native to the area where it is found, which reproduces rapidly and causes major ecological changes where introduced, negatively affecting the economy, environment or human health. In Missouri, they can take many forms, such as feral hogs, or zebra mussels, or purple loostrife.

Although he worked in the Department of Conservation, until he took the coordinator's job, Banek was unaware of how widespread invasive species have become in Missouri.

"I will admit myself that I was so focused on the things I dealt with in my old job that it was hard to appreciate the scope of this problem," Banek said. "Until you get a statewide perspective, you have no idea how dramatic this problem is and how much it costs. Invasive species affect fish, wildlife and their habitat. That affects hunting and fishing, and that affects tourism and the economy."

As invasive species coordinator, Banek is fighting invasives identified by the state of Missouri, such as:

• The rusty crayfish, whose size and aggressive behavior enable it to displace other crayfish species


• Johnson grass, a toxic plant that is prolific on disturbed areas, causing problems for farmers


• Purple loosestrife, a wetland plant that crowds out cattails, reeds, sedges and other habitat and food plants with a dense mat of vegetation that offers nothing to waterfowl or other wetland wildlife


• Feral hogs, which consume vegetation and wildlife, plow up forests, deprive deer, turkeys and other wildlife of food and carry potentially devastating livestock and human diseases


• Zebra mussels. Arriving in 1988 from Russia's Caspian Sea, zebra mussels have spread to many waterways, such as the Mississippi, Hudson, St. Lawrence, Ohio, Cumberland, Missouri, Tennessee, Colorado, and Arkansas rivers, disrupting the ecosystems and damaging harbors, boats, and power plants and water treatment plants. The U.S. Coast Guard estimates that economic losses and control efforts cost the United States about $5 billion a year.


• the Japanese barberry, which impairs forest regeneration


• Asian bush honeysuckle, which forms tangled thickets, shading out native forest plants and wildlife


• spotted knapweed, a spindly weed with purple flowers that takes over roadsides and other areas previously occupied by native plants that are beneficial to wildlife


• the emerald ash borer, the larvae of which feed on the inner bark of ash trees, disrupting the trees' ability to transport water and nutrients


• Silver carp, also called Asian carp. Cultivated in China for food, this fish was introduced to North America in the 1970s to control algae growth in aquaculture and municipal wastewater treatment facilities. They quickly escaped and are now considered a highly invasive species. By 2003, they had spread into the Mississippi, Illinois, Ohio and Missouri rivers and many of their tributaries.

Then he developed an outreach effort to help Missourians understand how invasive species affect them and what they can do to stop them.

He expects Missouri residents to watch for and report invasive species and battle invasives on their own properties.

To help people recognize high-priority invasive species, Banek worked with exhibit designers to produce table-top displays of zebra mussels, rusty crayfish, emerald ash borers, feral hogs and silver carp. These will tour the state.

Believing that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, Banek's first priority is identifying those invasive species that are not yet in Missouri and developing plans to deal with them quickly if they do appear.

Next, he is attacking invasives that are already in Missouri and might submit to quick eradication action.

"Many of these plants are hard to kill with herbicides or mechanical means like burning or disking or they simply are too numerous," said Banek. "Anything you do has to be a multi-year effort, and when you have vast expanses those methods are prohibitively expensive or impractical. We have to think of new ways to approach it. Biological controls are one of the best approaches we have right now."

Another key to solving the invasive species problem is not contributing to it. The Conservation Department is developing policies to prevent agency activities from spreading invasive species and public education efforts aim to help citizens do the same.

Banek also is spearheading a state review process for plants and animals that people want to import for various purposes.

"If we had been doing this 50 years ago," he said, "we could have saved a lot of trouble introducing and then eradicating multiflora rose, sericea lespedeza, Asian carp and other plants and animals that have succeeded too well."

Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2008. All rights reserved.