SURVEY OF RESEARCH NEEDS FOR
ECOLOGICALLY SOUND MANAGEMENT OF INVASIVE PLANTS
Marie Jasieniuk
January 2002
A major component of the Center for Invasive Plant Management's (CIPM's) mission is "to
promote ecologically sound management of invasive plants in western North America by
promoting research and facilitating regional collaboration among researchers and land
managers." I conducted an email survey of 50 individuals that work on invasive species to
get their thoughts on what research needs to be conducted to develop ecologically sound
management programs for invasive plants, and how best to facilitate collaboration between
researchers and land managers. I surveyed a diversity of individuals ranging from county
weed supervisors to basic researchers for their responses to the following questions:
1. What type of research is needed to develop ecologically sound management
programs for invasive plants?
2. What type of research would most serve the needs of your organization (BIA,
BLM, NPS, TNC, USDA, USFS, USGS, state and county agencies, the
University community)?
3. What type of research should be given highest priority? Is basic research designed
to understand the invasion process more or less important than research designed
to develop management programs for specific problems?
4. How might basic ecological research results best be communicated to and
incorporated by land managers?
5. How responsive are basic researchers to designing studies that address the more
immediate problems of land managers? How might communication between the
two groups be improved?
The following table describes the categories of individuals I surveyed and the number of
individuals surveyed in each.
Association
No. of Individuals Surveyed
Private Companies
2
Nature Conservancy
3
County Weed Supervisors
3
State Weed Control Associations
2
State Agriculture Departments
4
Bureau of Indian Affairs
1
Bureau of Land Management
2
Forest Service
3
National Park Service
2
USGS
2
USDA-ARS
2
University Extension/Research
23
NGO Lands Alliance
1
TOTAL
50

The survey was conducted when Dr. Jasieniuk was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Dept. of
Land Resources & Environmental Sciences, Montana State University-Bozeman.
SUMMARY OF RESPONSES
CENTER FOR INVASIVE PLANT MANAGEMENT SURVEY
JANUARY 2002
Question 1. What type of research is needed to develop ecologically sound management
programs for invasive plants?
1. Research on environmental and economic impacts of invasive plants was
considered essential by county agents, resource managers, and researchers.
County agents, in particular, indicated a need for scientific information to either
support or refute casual environmental impact statements they hear. County
agents also indicated a need for scientific evaluations of impacts in order to argue
for continued support of their management efforts. Respondents stated that county
agents and land managers need both economic and environmental impact
assessments in order to prioritize species and areas for management. One
respondent indicated the importance of determining whether there were critical
thresholds of invasive plants leading to negative impacts. (9 of a total of 18
respondents)
2. Research predicting the risk of future invasion and directed toward the
development of risk analysis tools was also considered essential by county agents,
resource managers, and researchers. One researcher indicated the need for spatial
and temporal predictive models with known (measured) levels of uncertainty.
Knowledge of economic and environment impacts (research area #1) together
with information on the risk of invasion allows prioritization of management
efforts and provides justification for support of current and future management
efforts by government agencies. (6 respondents)
3. Research identifying the characteristics of exotic species that lead to successful
invasion, including assessments of the habitat requirements of invasives, their
biology and ecology, and the factors that influence population growth. (6
respondents)
4. Research on biological control including the population biology of invasive plants
and their biological control agents, and the effect of interactions with other
species on the success of biocontrol agents. (5 respondents)
5. Assessments of factors that make habitats vulnerable to invasion and methods to
increase resistance to future invasion. (4 respondents)
6. Research on protocols to inventory and monitor invasive plants and their spread.
(4 respondents)
7. Research on chemical and non-chemical control strategies and their costs and
benefits. (4 respondents)
8. Research on the impacts of control methods including how management actions
affect the target and background community. (3 respondents)
9. Research on species interactions in plant communities, including plant-plant
chemical interactions and plant-microbial-plant community interactions. (3
respondents)
10. Research on restoration and methods to make plant communities resistant to
future invasion, including research on successional weed management and what
species or functional groups can satisfy the land use objective and provide
competition with invasives following restoration or removal of invasive species.
(3 respondents)
11. Research on methods to prevent or minimize the introduction and spread of "new"
species. Research should consider possible changes in land management and
regulations, not just biologically-based prevention tools. Changes in regulations
could mean prohibiting planting and sale of known or potentially invasive plants
or products transporting invasive weed seeds as to minimize sources of
"infection". (2 respondents)
12. Research on the relationship between genetic diversity, polyploidy, and
invasibility. (1 respondent)
13. Research targeted to specific landowner needs that will in fact work in the "field."
(1 respondent)
Question 2. What type of research would most serve the needs of your organization (BIA,
BLM, NPS, TNC, USDA, USFS, USGS, state and county weed agencies, the University
community)?
Many respondents indicated that their answer for question 1 was also their answer for question 2.
The following lists the answers that differed from those for question 1.
Nature Conservancy:
1. All types of research are necessary but in general, there is a need to reduce the emphasis
on control and increase the emphasis on prevention, early detection, and rapid response.
2. Spatial distribution of invasive plants particularly at the national forest or large spatial
scale.
3. Predictive models indicating areas likely to be infested.
USGS: Research that is integrated and iterative, otherwise it will not be useful or cost-effective in
the long run.
State Weed Agencies:
1. Research oriented towards determining when management objectives are achievable and
when they are not, e.g. which populations can be eradicated and which cannot.
2. Research providing tools that indicate where boundaries should be drawn and how to
enforce these boundaries when containing larger populations.
3. Research on the vectors of dispersal and spread for given invasive species.
4. Research on methods of controlling invasive plants within public rights of way and
public land, particularly research on which herbicides are the most ecologically sound
and their proper methods of application.
County Weed Agencies
1. Research on environmental impacts of invasives, including losses to native, beneficial
and T&E species.
2. Research on economic losses and additional expenses related to allowing an invasive
species establish.
3. Research on threats of species, including orange hawkweed and tansy ragwort, and where
they can establish.
4. Identifying biological control agents for species that currently don't have adequate
biological control, such as sulfur cinquefoil and field bindweed.
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5. Means of managing aquatic weeds.
6. Quantifying weed seed movement, such as scentless chamomile, coming in grass seed,
hay and other feed coming from Canada.
7. Research on groundwater contamination by herbicides and standardized cutoffs for use
depending on water table depth.
8. Effects of interactions of biocontrol agents with other insects on their effectiveness on
invasive plants.
9. Research on combining chemical and non-chemical methods for weed management and
research on alternative non-chemical methods for invasive weed management.
10. If it is determined that there is a large potential for detriment when a species establishes,
then we need research on its weaknesses and what we can do to prevent or reduce the
opportunity for establishment. If established, we need to determine effective solutions for
managing the detrimental species, and reducing its ability to expand.
University Community:
1. Basic research on the actual threats of invasives and the consequences of various
management actions (including no management) on other components of the biotic
community.
2. All types of research.
3. Research on prevention and biological control.
4. Basic research or practical research that is publishable in peer-reviewed journals.
5. Research at many different levels.
6. Basic research on the invasion process, genetic variation within invasive species, and
risks of habitat invasion by exotics; applied research on the management of invasives.
Question 3. What type of research should be given highest priority? Is basic research
designed to understand the invasion process more or less important than research designed
to develop management programs for specific problems?
Most respondents indicated that both basic research and applied research, designed to address
specific management problems, are essential for management programs to be successful over the
long term. Basic research designed to understand the invasion process can potentially reveal the
underlying causes or factors that promote exotic invasions. Controlling invasive species without
understanding the causes and dynamics of plant invasions is likely to be a bandaid solution only
and will continue to be a constant battle. Thus, basic research is critical to good management.
Basic research has the additional benefit that it can open peoples eyes to new approaches. Basic
research can also provide a knowledge base that can be used to address invasive weed problems
in the future.
However, basic research alone is not sufficient in many cases. Studies often take too long
whereas managers may need to take action now. In the latter case, adaptive management,
whereby management practices are continuously reassessed and modified as new information
becomes available, may be the appropriate approach to managing invasive species. Several
respondents viewed applied research, both ecological and management oriented, as critical to
controlling invasives.
One respondent indicated that regulatory/policy tools for prevention need to be considered in
addition to basic ecological research and research directed towards specific management
problems. The respondent viewed exotic invasions as problems resulting from "human behavior"
(e.g., land use and management choices). Thus, effective means of preventing invasions may be
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through changes in land use and management practices and regulations concerning the planting
and sale of known or potentially invasive plants.
Question 4. How might basic ecological research results best be communicated to and
incorporated by land managers?
When research comes out that can be used by managers, there should be a synopsis or abstract of
the information written in a language targeted at land managers. The information should be
concise, pertinent, and easy to read, and communicated in condensed form using tools such as
MONTS guides, email, web sites, and listservs.
1. Training sessions with the most current ecological research findings should be organized
for managers. Demonstration plots are good ways to present the information.
2. Researchers need to work with extension specialists to continuously improve their
reference materials on invasive species management. Agriculture extension services or
other university programs can help disseminate basic ecological information to managers.
3. Researchers need to be trained to be better communicators to a range of audiences. The
Aldo Leopold Leadership Program (ALLP) could be used as a model for this type of
training.
4. Land managers could attend meetings of the Society for Ecological Restoration, EPPC,
and the Ecological Society of America where there is an opportunity for interaction with
researchers.
5. Invited workshops could be designed specifically to bring managers and basic researchers
together. These could be funded by various agencies, including the Center for Invasive
Plant Management.
6. Researchers should take whatever opportunities are available to explain to land managers
how basic research on the ecology of the invasion process fits in with invasive weed
management in the field. Some of the information will be lost on the managers at first but
eventually, with increased knowledge, land managers will realize that the better one
understands the process of invasion, the better one can create management systems that
take advantage of this knowledge. For example, if increased available N is indeed found
to be the key driver of invasion and disturbance creates a pulse in available N, then
managers can take steps to tie up N in plant communities and thus reduce or prevent
weed invasion.
7. There need to be increased opportunities for three-way communication among
researchers, funding sources, and land managers. Information regarding needs, abilities,
and resources can be communicated so that everyone works together toward an agreed
upon common goal.
8. Methodologies need to be developed that allow land managers to make measurements
and evaluate the success of their management practices conforming to an adaptive
management philosophy. Decision support systems could be developed to help interpret
their results.
Question 5. How responsive are basic researchers to designing studies that address the more
immediate problems of land managers? How might communication between the two groups
be improved?
1. Basic researchers have been unresponsive, too simplistic, and biased toward
small-scale, short-term results in artificial environments. Their conclusions do not
map well on to large (real) landscapes, because they have failed to incorporate
issues of interacting, complex processes that operate at larger scales (e.g., fire,
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2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
herbivory, succession, climate change, air pollution, land use change, disturbance
corridors such as roads and riparian zones). Many researchers have failed to see
what land managers do on a daily basis. Researchers and managers must work
more closely and in real landscapes rather than on test-tube sand boxes.
Generally basic and applied researchers are not responsive to the problems of land
managers. The two groups work in different time frames. Managers need
information now, not 2-10 years into the future. Researchers, with the exception
of Federal researchers, do not get "credit" for meeting land managers' needs.
Major funding organizations often do not worry about managers' needs in
designing their RFP's.
Most basic scientists at universities are driven by their curiosity and need to be
challenged conceptually to get interested in a problem. Thus, purely applied
research, such as determining which herbicide kills a plant most effectively, is
very constraining and not of interest to basic researchers. Further, it is very
difficult to design experiments and studies that are both directly applicable and
intellectually cutting-edge thus it is not surprising that they don't get combined
very often. The best approach may be to mix projects that are more applied with
other projects that are more conceptual.
Basic researchers can be very responsive if research funding is available. Many
scientists would be interested in broadening their scope to address more practical,
applicable problems if the research funding was available.
Communication would be greatly enhanced if more collaborations were
developed and if funding agencies made collaborations between researchers and
land managers a priority in their criteria for support.
Creating reward systems within academic institutions (see the Research Panel
Process of FS research or USGS) and enhancing funding mechanisms (new
program within NSF; increasing funding into the Invasives program of CSREES)
would certainly help.
Perhaps basic researchers should be required to have an advisory panel of diverse
weed/land managers with whom they communicate twice per year. This could
help to ensure that the researcher's future work will better encompass managers'
needs and build a positive base of support for the researcher among local land and
weed managers.
More needs to be done to improve three-way communication between
researchers, funding sources, and land managers to effectively relay information
as to needs, abilities, and resources so that everyone is working together toward
an agreed upon common goal.
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