SBSC Weekly Highlights, August 8, 2005
Submitted by Kristin Brown
The USGS's Southwest Exotic Plant Mapping Project (SWEMP) facilitates the development of a regional database of invasive non-native plants in the Southwest: The SWEMP team, in partnership with The Nature Conservancy, recently completed development of computer tools that will help land managers better share invasive plant occurrence and distribution data. In particular, this project was undertaken to provide the Cooperative Weed Management Areas (CWMA) in the Southwest better tools to share invasive plant data with all member partners. New tools include a data entry tool where occasional observations of invasive plant occurrences can be directly submitted to the SWEMP team. A new interactive map allows clients to interactively view the database and print out 'maplets' of areas of interest. The data query tool allows clients to select portions of the regional database that are of interest using several criteria. Individual members of CWMAs can use this tool to download invasive plant information across the entirety of the CWMA. In addition, a southwest modification (SW-WIMS) of a Conservancy developed data management application is available for download. SW-WIMS can be used for to organize and manage field collected invasive plant data including treatment and monitoring information. The tools can be accessed through the hosting Southwest Exotic Plant Information Clearinghouse home page (http://sbsc.wr.usgs.gov/research/projects/swepic/swepic.asp) under the Map and SWEMP links. For more information contact: Kathryn_A_Thomas@usgs.gov, 928.556.7327.
Studies on Ant and Grasshopper Communities Presented at International Meetings: Tim Graham will be presenting his studies of ant and grasshopper communities as indicators of rangeland health at two international meetings in Canada. A poster titled Ant Communities of the Colorado Plateau and Great Basin: Comparisons of Structure in Space and Time Using Genus and Functional Group Classifications
by Tim B. Graham and Wyatt I. Williams, will be presented at the Ecological Society of America meeting in Montreal August -8-12, 2005. Tim will present his paper titled Grasshopper communities in native and non-native grasslands on the Colorado Plateau: differences in density and species composition,
and a poster titled Comparison of Orthoptera communities in Salt Creek, Canyonlands National Park: fluctuations over time in open-, closed-, and no-road parts of the canyon
, co-authored by Kelly N. Wilson, at the 9th International Orthopterists' Society meeting, in Canmore, Alberta, Canada, August 14-20. Contact: Tim Graham, Moab, Utah, tim_graham@usgs.gov, (435) 719-2339.
Media contact:
Kathleen Ingley of the Arizona Republic contacted Southwest Biological Science Center ecologist Kathryn Thomas to discuss the need for data collection and sharing for invasive non-native plants in the Southwest, what is needed in order to strengthen the efforts to map invasive plants and the impacts these plants are having on the Sonoran Desert ecology. Ingley is writing a three part editorial series on invasive plant issues in the Sonoran Desert to appear 8/7-9.
