Existing National Invasive Management Programs

A number of international, national, and regional efforts are underway to attempt to reduce the risks posed by invasive species. Some of these efforts for the United States are discussed briefly below, with a focus on programs related to forest and rangeland ecosystems. It is beyond the scope of this review to discuss all international programs that may provide valuable information for invasive species in the United States. However, some sources of global information are mentioned in the subsequent section on invasive species databases.

The National Invasive Species Council (NISC) consists of eight Federal departments and was formed in 1999 by Executive Order 13112. The NISC 2001 National Management Plan called for development of a risk analysis system for non-native species by 2003. The NISC is intended to provide a gateway to information, programs, organizations, and services about invasive species. Their web site ( http://www.invasivespecies.gov) provides information about the impacts of invasive species and the Federal government's response, as well as select species profiles and links to agencies and organizations dealing with invasive species issues.

The USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) protects not only agricultural but also forest, rangeland, and wetland ecosystems. APHIS works closely with the USDA Forest Service and the U.S. Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, and Fish and Wildlife Service. APHIS conducts risk assessments with a dual mission to promote international trade and prevent invasive species that may cause serious harm from entering the United States. Some APHIS activities focus on protecting and managing endangered species as well as migratory bird populations. APHIS maintains the Port Information Database, and there is great potential to strengthen and make broader use of this database for understanding the pathways taken by invasive species entering the United States (NRC 2002).

The USDA Forest Service, working in conjunction with Federal, State, Tribal, and private partners, has developed the Early Warning System (EWS) to detect and respond to environmental threats to forest lands in the United States. The EWS is composed of many existing programs, along with new initiatives such as the Western Wildland Environmental Threat Assessment Center and the Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center. The EWS addresses potential catastrophic threats such as insects, diseases, invasive species, fire, weather-related risks, and other episodic events. The system is intended to:

1. improve understanding of the crucial elements involved in early detection and response to environmental threats
2. help identify and remedy weaknesses in the current system of early detection and response
3. aid for strategic planning and resource allocation

There are many groups both within and outside the Forest Service that participate in the process of detecting and responding to threats to forests. Further information about some component groups that conduct regional risk analyses is presented in other chapters in this volume. Further information about the EWS is available at the following web site: < http://www.fs.fed.us/foresthealth/programs/early_warning_system.shtml>.

The National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA) and the U.S. Geological Service (USGS) are developing a National Invasive Species Forecasting System (ISFS) for the management and control of invasive species on Department of Interior and adjacent lands. The system provides a framework for using USGS’s early detection and monitoring protocols and predictive models to process remote sensing data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS), the Enhanced Thematic Mapper, and the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer as well as commercial remote sensing data. The goal is to create on-demand, regional-scale assessments of invasive species patterns and vulnerable habitats. Additional information can be found at the following web site: http://bp.gsfc.nasa.gov/. This approach has recently been used to predict the relative suitability of all areas in the conterminous United States for tamarisk, an invasive woody shrub (Morisette and others 2006). This analysis is reviewed below under the heading of USGS & NASA Invasive Species MODIS-Regression Methodology.

Within the USDA Forest Service, the establishment of the two Threat Assessment Centers is a key part of the strategy for improving the management of invasive species. These efforts build upon ongoing programs and projects such as the Forest Inventory and Analysis Program (including Forest Health Monitoring) and Forest Health Protection. Further information about the strategies of these agencies for invasive species management is provided at the following web site: http://www.off-road.com/land/invasive_species_strategy.html. Recommendations for control of invasives in rangelands are provided at the following web site: http://www.fs.fed.us/rangelands/ecology/invasives.shtml

The USDA Forest Service’s Forest Health Technology Enterprise Team (FHTET) is using an expert opinion approach to model risks of invasive pests and tree pathogens at the national scale for national strategic planning purposes. Potential tree mortality risk is modeled based on expert opinion, forest inventory data, and other GIS (geographic information system) data (Marsden and others 2005), also see the following URL: http://www.fs.fed.us/foresthealth/technology/products.shtml. Further discussion of this approach is presented below under the heading of “FHTET national risk map”.