NBII Partner Gives Opening Keynote at 2010 Stiltgrass Summit

Les Mehrhoff, Director of the Invasive Plant Atlas of New England (IPANE), a partner organization of NBII’s Northeast Information Node (NIN) and Invasive Species Information Node (ISIN), gave the opening Keynote address at the 2010 Stiltgrass Summit, which took place at Southern Illinois University on August 11-12.  The summit was organized and hosted by Chris Evans, Director of the River to River Cooperative Weed Management Area (CWMA).  The meeting kicked off with a field trip to see some stands of Microstegium vimineum and some control work being done by River to River CWMA and some of their partners.  The second day was devoted to research papers on Japanese Stiltgrass biology, ecology, and management.  Around 100 professionals from municipal, county, state and federal agencies, conservation organizations, and academia attended.   Les’ presentation, entitled “Microstegium vimineum: What George Ainslie’s Discovery Means to Us,” is available online at: http://www.rtrcwma.org/stiltgrass/  For more information on Microstegium vimineum, visit IPANE, a partner of the northeast and invasive information nodes, at http://nbii-nin.ciesin.columbia.edu/ipane/.

For additional information please contact: Dr. Les Mehrhoff, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Connecticut at les.mehrhoff@uconn.edu or (860) 486-5708.


(Photo: Leaves of Japanese stiltgrass (Microstegium vimineum) growing on the edge of an eastern hardwood forest. Credit: © 2008 Elizabeth A. Sellers, Courtesy of life.nbii.gov)