The Nature Conservancy of Hawai`i is currently (1989) engaged in active alien plant control on two large montane forest and shrubland preserves on the islands of Moloka`i and Maui. The national Conservancy organization is in the process of developing comprehensive guidelines for the use of pesticides in alien species control and is producing an Element Stewardship Abstract database to assemble ...

First, a geographical barrier must be overcome, which often occurs as a mountain range, ocean, or similar physical barrier to movement of seeds and other reproductive plant parts. Plants that overcome geographical barriers are known as alien plants or alien species. Alien plants are non-native plants and alien species are nonnative species. Therefore, non-native plants are those that occur outs...

Apis mellifera L. is a generalist pollinator present in most of the Canary Islands. When foraging, honeybees transfer pollen grains to honey, and presence and abundance of pollen from different species can be interpreted as a sign of local flora, and a cue to spread of aliens. The relative use of alien vs native species by honeybees could influence island pollination mutualisms and/or favour al...

1. During the last centuries many alien species have established and spread in new regions, where some of them cause large ecological and economic problems. As one of the main explanations of the spread of alien species, the enemy-release hypothesis is widely accepted and frequently serves as justification for biological control. 2. We used a global fungus–plant host distribution data set for 1...

Herbert Baker arguably initiated the search for species characteristics determining alien plant invasion success, with his formulation of the 'ideal weed'. Today, a profusion of studies has tested a myriad of traits for their importance in explaining success of alien plants, but the multiple, not always appropriate, approaches used have led to some confusion and criticism. We argue that a great...

Despite biological invasions being a worldwide phenomenon causing significant ecological, economic, and human welfare impacts, there is limited understanding regarding how environmental managers perceive the problem and subsequently manage alien species. Spanish environmental managers were surveyed using questionnaires to (1) analyze the extent to which they perceive plant invasions as a proble...

An explanation for successful invasion is that invasive alien species sustain less pressure from natural enemies than co-occurring native species. Using meta-analysis, we examined whether invasive species: (1) incur less damage, (2) exhibit better performance in the presence of enemies, and (3) tolerate damage more than native species. Invasive alien species did not incur less damage than nativ...

Endemics and alien organisms can be considered two faces of the same coin, since management of both groups of taxa have strongly interrelated conservation implications. Islands are rich in endemic species and are also very vulnerable to biological invasions. We analysed the biogeography and taxonomy of endemic and alien terrestrial species in the Canary Islands including fungi, lichens, bryophy...

Soil nitrogen and phosphorus are commonly limiting elements affecting plant species richness in temperate zones. Our species richness-ecological study was performed in alder-dominated forests representing temperate floodplains (streamside alder forests of Alnion incanae alliance) and swamp forests (alder carrs of Alnion glutinosae alliance) in the Western Carpathians. Species richness (i.e., th...

Traits that differ between invasive alien and native plant species are frequently interpreted as traits conferring invasiveness. However. such dilferences could reHect an introduction bias of alien species, particularly clllLivated ones, 01' hllman-medialed selection of cultivars of these species with certain traits. We tested whether this is the case for germination characteristics that are fr...