Ecology 6th Edition by Charles Krebs

Exercise 8

Purple loosestrife ( Lythrum salicaria) is a wetland plant introduced to North America from Europe in the early 1800s. It has been declared a severe environmental problem in Canada and the United States because it is believed to take over wetlands, displacing native vegetation and adversely affecting wildlife species. Discuss how you would test die hypothesis that purple loosestrife has detrimental effects on other species in wetlands so that biological control should be used. Compare your action plan with the data presented by Blossey et al. (2001), who decided that purple loosestrife does have adverse effects.