Name: _______________________________
Invasive Species
"Invasive species" - it doesn’t sound very
threatening, does it? But these invaders, large
and small, have devastating effects on wildlife.
About 42% of threatened or endangered species
in the U.S. are at risk due to invasive species.The
impacts of invasive species cost billions of dollars
each year. Many of our commercial, agricultural,
and recreational activities depend on healthy
native ecosystems.
An invasive species can be any kind of
living organism—an amphibian, plant, insect, fish,
fungi, bacteria, or even an organism’s seeds or eggs—that is not native to an
ecosystem and which causes harm. Species that grow and reproduce quickly, and
spread aggressively, with potential to cause harm, are given the label “invasive”.
Invasive species are mainly spread by human activities, often by accident.
People, and the goods we use, travel around the world very quickly, and they often
carry uninvited species with them. Some ways they spread are by boats/ships,
shipping goods, decorative plants escaping into the wild, and by the pet trade.
1. What do invasive species cause?
________________________________________________________________
2. What depends on a healthy native ecosystem?
________________________________________________________________
3. What does invasive mean?
________________________________________________________________
4. How do invasive species spread? (List two ways)
________________________________________________________________
5. European rabbits are an invasive species. What country do you think they
invaded? (No wrong answers on this one, just guess)
___________________________________
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RABBITS
ARE
THE
CUTEST
INVASIVE
SPECIES
How to draw a rabbit in 6 steps.