OT-PLANTS: exotic pest plant legislation
- Subject: OT-PLANTS: exotic pest plant legislation
- From: L* M*
- Date: Fri, 22 Mar 2002 08:33:52 -0500
I forwarded Rita G's question to the Tennessee Exotic Pest Plant Council
& received a reply from Jack Ranney, Chair of the Invasive Plant
Committee for SAMAB (Southern Applachian Man and the Biosphere
Program). SAMAB is an umbrella organization that facilitates discussion
& research about environmental concerns among federal and private
landowners in parts of several adjacent states (east TN, western NC,
etc).
He sent me quite a long reply, which I will gladly forward to anyone who
wants to read the whole thing. The bottom line answer to your question,
Rita, is that he doesn't know of any websites that give both sides of
the issue.
Basically, he says that:
< The issue demands more attention than it is getting.> States have
Exotic Pest Plant Councils that range all the way from not much to at
least one state being sued for being overly agressive/too broad in its
legislation.
There needs to be more collaboration between the horticultural/nursery
business and the Pest Plant councils. Jack sent me a copy of a document
put together by the Missouri Botanical Garden that identifies things
that need input from the nursery folks: problems need to be more
accurately identified (which regions and what types of threats) and the
nursery industry brought in to help find solutions. Tennessee's Pest
Plant council has gotten this kind of input & review.
As shows in the posts here following Rita's initial question, there is a
lot of confusion over what is meant by <exotic pest plants>, especially
among the general public, i.e., trumpet vine is not exotic, and while it
might be a pest in certain circumstances, it isn't invasive of 'natural'
areas, crowding out native species. Some species are invasive (pests)
some places, not others; some plant common names (i.e., privet) include
several species, some pestiferous, others not.
Jack says <Generally, it is not USDA that is putting many species on the
invasives
list. They have been slow to follow the more aggressive actions of >
states, National Park Service etc. The federal stuff seems to be more
geared toward NOT <intentionally> planting invasive exotic species (like
they used to do), but using native species instead.
The feds are also ordering states to do their own legislation and
perhaps that's what your speaker was concerned about.
Conservation organizations (National Park Service, state Heritage
Programs etc) have been mostly concerned about invasive exotic species
in in woodlands or wildlands (i.e, parks and natural areas).
The USDA is moving more slowly, & has mostly dealt with agricultural
pests plants (i.e., noxious weeds).
An additional concern: <Some green industry stakeholders [nursery
industry, I think this means] have taken a very hard-nosed response that
until the threat/damage can be conclusively proven (by then the horse is
out of the barn), they should be free to sell what they want. This
course
is inappropriate (gives both the green industry and the invasive plant
control interests a bad name).] Jack Ranney, Chair of the Invasive
Plant Committee for SAMAB.
Summarized and interpreted by Linda Mann east TN zone 7/8
with apologies to Jack if I misinterpreted what he sent me
------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Buy Stock for $4.
No Minimums.
FREE Money 2002.
http://us.click.yahoo.com/BgmYkB/VovDAA/ySSFAA/2gGylB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
