|
UF/IFAS Hydrilla IPM and Florida LAKEWATCH were awarded funding for a collaborative study
Emma Weeks, Jennifer Gillett-Kaufman and Jim Cuda of UF/IFAS and Mark Hoyer of Florida LAKEWATCH recently received funding from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to work together on a new project. This project, which also includes Mark Jackson of the National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research (USDA-ARS, Illinois), will build upon the Research and Extension efforts that were implemented by the UF/IFAS Hydrilla IPM RAMP team.
ABOVE: The field site for completion of our experiments. The floating structures in the water are limnocorrals. Each limnocorral is a floating permeable tube that is open at the bottom and is placed over the substrate containing growing hydrilla. Each of the four limnocorrals has one of the four treatments: a control, the midge, the fungus and the midge plus the fungus.
Research at UF/IFAS is ongoing to evaluate novel and sustainable management tactics and to help develop integrated pest management plans for hydrilla. The previous grant-funded project identified hydrilla management tools that were effective and demonstrated that tools could be combined to further improve hydrilla control. These tools included the hydrilla tip-mining midge, a plant-pathogenic fungus and the herbicide imazamox. The current project will build on these results through the completion of field-based experiments with the tools applied in different combinations as well as all three tools applied together.
As part of the previous project, several educational materials were produced including brochures, booklets, books and promotional items such as bookmarks, boat rulers and web cards. Our newest release is the Hydrilla Integrated Management book (144 pages), which delivers up-to-date information on hydrilla management tactics. The book is available online. Through our new grant-funded project we will be able to evaluate our existing educational materials and design new materials that satisfy the needs of this involved group of stakeholders. If you would like to help us do this please follow this link to our survey.
ABOVE: Members of the Hydrilla IPM CPPM team including Jason "Mo" Bennett of Florida LAKEWATCH (left), and UF/IFAS students Adriana Mitchell (right) and Nicole Miller (center). Measurements are taken before and after treatment application including percentage cover of hydrilla and depth from the surface.
We acknowledge our funding currently provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), Crop Protection and Pest Management Program (grant 2014-70006-22517). and previously provided by the USDA NIFA Risk Avoidance and Mitigation Program (grant 2010-51100-21653).
|
