National Invasive Species Information Center
U.S. Department of Agriculture

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  • Firefighting Cattle: Targeted Grazing Makes Firebreaks in Cheatgrass

    • Oct 1, 2020

    • United States Department of Agriculture.

    • Cattle grazing on a nearly half mile wide targeted strip of cheatgrass near Beowawe, Nevada, created a firebreak that helped limit a rangeland fire to just 54 acres this past August compared to rangeland fires that more commonly race across thousands of acres of the Great Basin. This "targeted grazing" firebreak and eight others are part of an evaluation project being managed by the Agricultural Research Service (ARS), partnering with other federal, state and local agencies and local cattle ranchers in Idaho, Nevada and Oregon. These demonstration sites are being studied so the concept's efficacy and environmental impacts can be uniformly evaluated and compared.

      Cheatgrass, also known as downy brome, is an invasive annual that dominates more than 100 million acres of the Great Basin in the western U.S. Germinating each winter, cheatgrass grows furiously in spring and dies in early summer, leaving the range carpeted in golden dry tinder. The Great Basin now has the nation's highest wildfire risk, and rangeland fires are outpacing forest fires when it comes to acreage destroyed.

  • Manual, Mechanical, and Cultural Methods and Tools

    • 2011

    • USDA. Forest Service.

    • Chapter 20 (pages 232-244) in:  Invasive Plant Management Issues and Challenges in the United States: 2011 Overview; Westbrooks, R., et al.; ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2011.

       

  • UF/IFAS Research: Can Artificial Intelligence Outsmart Invasive Species?

    • Feb 29, 2024

    • University of Florida. IFAS Extension.

    • Is artificial intelligence (AI) a viable tool in the fight against invasive species? UF/IFAS scientists are exploring that question on a small scale in a project using traps equipped with AI technology. For this study, the traps are targeting Argentine black and white tegus in Fort Pierce. Scientists hope these AI 'smart traps' will help suppress and remove an established population of these lizards that have quickly invaded this Treasure Coast city. St. Lucie county has become a hot spot for tegus over the last seven years.