the same, and this goes not just for other parts of the United States but all
around the world. DAISIE, a database of invasives in Europe, tracks more
than twelve thousand species. APASD (the Asian-Pacific Alien Species
Database), FISNA (the Forest Invasive Species Network for Africa), IBIS
(the Island Biodiversity and Invasive Species Database), and NEMESIS (the
National Exotic Marine and Estuarine Species Information System) track
thousands more. In Australia, the problem is so severe that from
preschool on, children are enlisted in the control effort. The city council
in Townsville, north of Brisbane, urges kids to conduct “regular hunts”
for cane toads, which were purposefully, albeit disastrously, introduced in
the nineteen-thirties to control sugarcane beetles. (Cane toads are
poisonous, and trusting native species, like the northern quoll, eat them
and die.) To dispose of the toads humanely, the council instructs children
to “cool them in a fridge for 12 hours” and then place them “in a freezer
for another 12 hours.” A recent study of visitors to Antarctica found that
in a single summer season, tourists and researchers brought with them
more than seventy thousand seeds from other continents. Already one
plant species, Poa annua, a grass from Europe, has established itself on
Antarctica; since Antarctica has only two native vascular plant species,
this means that a third of its vascular plants are now invaders.
tuis.
(Tuis.)
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