What should a government agency consider before bringing a hardy but nonindigenous species to another country?

Answer 1

There are many things that should be considered before bringing in a non-indigenous species. Past experiences should be one of the main ones but like most reasons this seems to be ignored. Some of the biggest disasters in the past are the Water Hyacinth brought in with no natural diseases or predators to keep it in check and it took over the water ways in the south, in many cases bringing transportation to a halt. Kudzu and the multi-floral rose are two plants introduced that took over the land for the same reasons. The introduction of the Nutria in the south to boost the fur trade nearly destroyed it because it had no natural predators. It would be nice to say that we learned our lesson from these experiences and many more like them, but there will undoubtedly be more lessons to come.

Answer 2

Well, "invasiveness" springs to mind, but there isn't really a totally accurate test for invasiveness as yet. It is a hot research topic.

Here are a couple sources of information:

Daehler, C. C., J. S. Denslow, S. Ansari, and H.-C. Kuo. 2004. A Risk-Assessment System for Screening Out Invasive Pest Plants from Hawaii and Other Pacific Islands. Conservation Biology 18 (2):360-368.

Hallett, S. G. 2006. Dislocation from coevolved relationships: a unifying theory for plant invasion and naturalization? Weed Science 54:8.

Answer 3

How it's going to fit into the ecology around it. Will it prey on an indigenous species and drive it to extinction? Be preyed on by a native species? Compete with native species for food or territory? Or simply multiply out of all reason?

Answer 4

The consequences. They brought coyotes from the west to the south a few years ago, saying it was to control the deer population. What a friggin' joke. Now we are infested - no deer, no rabbits, no small wild animals and you had better watch out for your small dogs and cats. I think little kids will be next on their chow list. Never met an animal I didn't just love - until I met a coyote!!

Answer 5

Does the plant have the threat of becoming invasive and taking over the niches of the native plants?
Are there any natural predators for the species to keep it in control?

Answer 6

yeah what Amy F said, Will this species cause a major effect upon this country's ecosystem in any way.

Answer 7

LOL
Kudzu

Answer 8

sounds like a homework question.