GPS helps map out location of destructive plants

FROM: The Naples Daily News

Southwest Florida natives are battling with foreigners for their existence.

The invaders come from places such as Brazil, Australia, Africa and Europe. They move into an area and take over, beating back locals that can't compete. They can't be stopped at the borders or rounded up and sent back home.

The invaders are not after local jobs and they are not driving up real estate prices.

They are plants.

But just because the exotic, invasive vegetation looks harmless, it could forever change the face of Florida if it is not stopped.

Members of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are on the front line in the battle to beat back the foreign plants and their newest weapons use the latest in technology.

Members of the service were at J.N. "Ding" Darling National Wildlife Refuge on Wednesday to train local biologists and volunteers to use geographic information systems to eradicate exotic plants.

With much of coastal Southwest Florida being developed, refuges, parks and preserves may be the last places where native species can thrive, said Jason Hensley, a member of the Fish and Wildlife's local invasive species strike team.

"These are areas that won't be developed," Hensley said. "If we don't get a handle on exotics in these natural areas, we could very easily lose them too."

Local biologists and volunteers set out into the refuge Wednesday with global positioning devices to map exotic species such as Brazilian pepper trees, torpedo grass, lead trees and bowstring hemp.

Once they find the plant, they pinpoint its location, enter the date, the plant's name, the percent of area it is covering and how far along it is in its growth stage.

Biologists can use the maps when they bid eradication jobs out to contractors, Hensley said.

After eradication efforts, biologists can go back through and see how treatments are working, said Jenny Ericson, acting invasion species coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Mapping also can help biologists define trends or areas where exotics are more prevalent, she said.

Florida is one of the most susceptible areas of the country to exotic species. Its subtropical to tropical climate allows a lot of plants to thrive. There is no winter to kill them and, because they are not native, they have no natural predators.

It is estimated that one-third of the plants growing wild in Florida are non-native and some of those have become a serious problem, Hensley said.

Last year the state spent $80 million killing exotics, he said.

"Its a massive effort and it's only just begun," Hensley said.

The problem with invasive species is they dominate an ecosystem to the point where a lot of native diversity is lost, said Brad Smith, a biologist with the Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation.

"It's not so much their presence; it's their dominance," Smith said. "They dominate to the extent of exclusivity."

When a foreign species takes over, it is the beginning of the end for native insects, birds and other animals, he said.

"The basis of an ecosystem is plant life," Smith said. "When you take away diversity and replace it with a single species, it is to the detriment of a lot of species higher up in the food chain."

Though Southwest Florida is covered in Brazilian pepper, melaleuca and Australian pine trees, there are success stories of eradication.

Sanibel used to be infested with Brazilian pepper until the city mandated that it be removed. Now it is under control and being eradicated.