Author
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Rossman, Amy |
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Submitted to: Bioscience
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal Publication Acceptance Date: 11/8/2000 Publication Date: N/A Citation: N/A Interpretive Summary: Plants and fungi are transported around the world and are often invading new habitats. These exotic species may be introduced on purpose or may be associated with crop seeds, raw logs and nursery stock. Recent use of molecular data has provided the means to document the origin of introduced non-indigenous organisms. In the case of fungi it is now possible to trace the origin of particular genotypes and document their movement from continent to continent. This paper is an introduction to a set of publications resulting from a symposium that addressed the question of how noxious plants and fungi have been transported around the world. ed around the world. Technical Abstract: Despite safeguards that have been in place since the early part of this century, plants and fungi have been transported relatively freely around the globe and thus have been inadvertently or intentionally introduced into ecosystems new to those organisms. In some cases, the plant or fungus encounters few of the factors that limit its spread in its natural habitat or is introduced into a novel habitat in which it can be thrive and even become dominant. The result may be devastating. The introduction of plants has often been intentional but the impact of the resulting invasive weed may go well beyond the desired effect. In recent decades the numbers of non-indigenous plants and fungi being introduced into the United States has increased causing many biologists to ask why and government regulatory agencies to question their plant quarantine procedures. Recently molecular data have provided the means to document the origin and movement of introduced organisms. Fungi are often transported unnoticed on or in plants and plant products particularly, those that are propagated or untreated. For plants the situation is different in that many plant invaders have been purposely introduced to serve, for example, as a rapidly growing pulp producing plant or more frequently as a cultivated garden plant, but, once introduced, can no longer be controlled escaping from cultivation and occasionally becoming weedy. This series of papers brings together case-studies of plants and fungi that have become biological invaders, traces their transport from their natural habitats to the places where they became noxious, and provides ideas on how this can be prevented. |
