Invasive Grasses of North America - Management

Management

In order to keep North American native grasses from potentially going extinct from invasive grasses, it is important to control or better yet prevent such invasions in the first place. There are many ways to go about this such as controlling species mechanically or physically. This includes hand removal of grasses or by machine. In a five-year study conducted by Wilson et al. (2001) in Western Oregon, showed that mowing prairies of the invasive grass Arrhenatherum elatius allowed the native grasses Danthonia californica and Festuca roemeri to flourish and out compete the non-natives. This is an effective method for the control of invasive grasses but it will take many hours of hard manual labor, which could be costly. Using chemicals is an effective way to control non-natives but it is not very ecologically friendly. Chemicals such as herbicides can contaminate waterways or kill other plants in the immediate area. Biological control is the use of other organism to reduce the invader grass. This has been proven to be effective but has also ricocheted back in a negative way. Other options include using multiple approaches at the same time, for example, mowing a specific region of grass land and then using an herbicide to target the invasive. The ultimate way to control invasive grasses in North America is to prevent them from entering in the first place. The first step of this prevention is identifying and regulating the grasses' pathway. After that it needs government assessment and policies to see that these pathways are blocked or regulated.