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Once common across eastern North America, the American elm is deeply ingrained in our nation's history. However, a large portion of the tree population was affected by Dutch Elm Disease beginning in the 1930s. Today, short-lived elms can still be found in forests, but because they tend to be much smaller, they no longer play such an important ecological role. A multifaceted collaborative effort is underway to restore the stately and once dominant American elm to persist on the landscape of the nation's forests.

From the forefront of forest research, the Northern Research Station invites you inside the largest forest research organization in the world — the USDA's Forest Service. In each podcast episode, you’ll hear stories, interviews, and special in-depth anthologies of the science that's studying, questioning, and solving some of today's most compelling forest issues.

Non-native invasive insects and pathogens are causing significant ecological damage to forests worldwide.  The first season explores biological invasions — and their repercussions — in the Midwest and the Northeast. The second season examines tree breeding and selection to promote resistance to invasive insects and diseases.

ForWarn is a satellite-based forest disturbance monitoring system for the conterminous United States. It delivers new forest change products every eight days and provides tools for attributing abnormalities to insects, disease, wildfire, storms, human development or unusual weather. Archived data provide disturbance tracking across all lands since 2000.

See also: Explore Search: White-Nose Syndrome for more FAQs

In parts of the South, there are stories about an invasive floating weed, which forms such a dense mass that it enables small animals to walk across water. This weed, called giant salvinia, is an exotic fern from South America that invades ponds, lakes, and other waterways in the United States. It damages aquatic ecosystems by outgrowing and replacing native plants that provide food and habitat for native animals and waterfowl.

Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists are testing a naturally occurring fungus (Myrothecium spp.) against giant salvinia to help control it. Initial tests have found that the fungus stops this problematic weed from growing and even can kill it.

Invasive species are one of the most dire threats to the endemic flora and fauna of the Galápagos Islands. One of the most aggressive species is the Giant African Snail (Lissachatina fulica), which was reported for the first time in Galápagos in 2010 and is a highly invasive species that appears on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) list of the 100 most harmful invasive species in the world. Galápagos Conservancy President Dr. Paul Salaman recently signed a new agreement with the Galápagos Biosecurity & Quarantine Regulation & Control Agency (ABG) to strengthen control actions and prevent the spread of the African snail on the islands.

MIPN synthesized recent research on garlic mustard and developed recommendations to help managers navigate sometimes-conflicting information about whether and how to prioritize management of this species. This 12 page guide includes a decision-support tree and a box discussion of best practices for volunteer pull events.

A new GBIF task group will address the urgent need for improved access to better data and information on invasive alien species in response to the landmark Invasive Alien Species Assessment approved by the the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) this month.
See related resource:  Media Release: IPBES (Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services) Invasive Alien Species Assessment

Anyone can help with nonnative species management. There are a variety of ways to get involved, and not all require slogging through swamps or handling wild animals. We want to encourage people to find ways they can participate. Every action helps protect native species!

See also: Biocontrol Factsheets for more information on biocontrol agents

Glacier National Park waters are generally open for boating from mid-May through October. All watercraft require an NPS inspection and permit before launching. Prior cleaning, draining, and drying of all watercraft, both externally and internally, will reduce inspection time significantly.

Access and compare risk assessment literature, methods and results from collaborators.

Quagga mussel larvae, or veligers, were first confirmed in Lake Powell in late 2012 after routine water monitoring tests discovered mussel DNA in water samples taken from the vicinity of Antelope Point and the Glen Canyon Dam. As of early 2016, thousands of adult quagga mussels have been found in Lake Powell, attached to canyon walls, the Glen Canyon Dam, boats, and other underwater structures, especially in the southern portions of the lake. It is crucial to keep the mussels from moving from Lake Powell to other lakes and rivers. Utah and Arizona state laws require you to clean, drain, and dry your boat when leaving Lake Powell using self-decontamination procedures.

The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) is an international network and data infrastructure funded by the world's governments and aimed at providing anyone, anywhere, open access to data about all types of life on Earth.

Provides mapping functions for species globally. The GBIF network draws sources together through the use of data standards, such as Darwin Core, which forms the basis for the bulk of GBIF.org's index of hundreds of millions of species occurrence records. Publishers provide open access to their datasets using machine-readable Creative Commons license designations, allowing scientists, researchers, and others to apply the data in hundreds of peer-reviewed publications and policy papers each year. Many of these analyses—which cover topics from the impacts of climate change and the spread of invasive and alien pests to priorities for conservation and protected areas, food security and human health— would not be possible without this.

Note: USGS's BISON (Biodiversity Information Serving Our Nation) which provided North American species occurrence data and maps moved away from the 10-year-old infrastructure of the previous BISON website (bison.usgs.gov) to a GBIF data portal for the U.S. provided by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). The new site became live on October 1, 2021, and the previous BISON website was be taken down on December 17, 2021.

The Global Invasive Species Database aims to increase awareness about invasive alien species and to facilitate effective prevention and management activities. The database focuses on invasive alien species that threaten native biodiversity and covers all taxonomic groups from micro-organisms to animals and plants in all ecosystems. Species information is either supplied by or reviewed by expert contributors from around the world. Provides distribution, life history, and impacts data for invasive species.
See related resource: 100 of the World's Worst Invasive Alien Species

GLOBAL is a five-year $3.2 million project funded by USDA. The project title is "Risk assessment and eradication of Globodera spp. in U.S. production of potato", with research focused on the potato cyst nematodes Globodera pallida (pale cyst nematode), G. rostochiensis (golden nematode), and the related species G. ellingtonae that has recently been found in Oregon and Idaho. GLOBAL stands for "Globodera Alliance", a group of 17 research, extension, and education professionals, located in Idaho, Oregon, New York, Canada, Scotland, and France. GLOBAL members include faculty from the University of Idaho, Oregon State University, Cornell University, US Department of Agriculture (USDA), Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, The James Hutton Institute, and the French National Institute for Agricultural Research.