Researchers seek additional
sites where mile-a-minute grows
Todd McLeish,
URI
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| Mile-A-Minute Vine with distinctive triangular leaves |
KINGSTON, R.I. – July 11, 2014 – Along a roadside in Hopkinton, Lisa Tewksbury uncapped several vials containing hundreds of tiny weevils and released them on a group of vines with triangular leaves. The weevils are known to only feed on mile-a-minute vine, an aggressive invasive plant native to the Far East that arrived in Rhode Island in 2008 and has taken up residence in several communities.
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| Weevil eating the Mile-A-Minute vine. QUESTION: what happens after the weevils are done eating? |
“Mile-a-minute is a very persistent plant that is difficult to get rid of,” said Tewksbury, a URI entomologist who is rearing 18,000 weevils for release this year. “We know that biocontrol works on this plant, so we’re hoping the weevil population will be self-perpetuating and they will keep mile-a-minute under control.”
Tewksbury asks the public to report populations of mile-a-minute vine so she can release weevils in those locations later this year. She can be reached at 401-874-2750 or lisat@uri.edu. To identify the plant, visit www.mam.uconn.edu/speciesID.html
Mile-a-minute was first discovered in the United States in the 1930s in the Mid-Atlantic States, where it is believed to have arrived via the horticulture trade. Since then it has spread to 10 states and become established along roadsides and streams, moving from place to place in the water and via animals that eat and distribute it.
Research on a biological control of the plant began in Delaware and New Jersey in 1996, and the weevil was approved for release in 2004. The feeding by adult weevils creates holes in the leaves of the plant, and females lay their eggs in the leaf tips. After hatching, the larvae feed inside the stem, preventing the plant from flowering and producing seeds.
Tewksbury released the first batch of weevils in Rhode Island in 2009 at a site in Cranston, with additional releases every year since 2011 in Cranston and East Greenwich. Weevils were first released in Hopkinton in 2013. Populations of mile-a-minute have also been found on Block Island, but Tewksbury has not released the insects there yet.
When the lab in New Jersey that was rearing the insects reached its capacity, Tewksbury began raising the insects at the URI BioControl Lab, with funding from the U.S. Forest Service and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Some of the weevils reared at URI are shared with researchers in Massachusetts and Connecticut.
Tewksbury hopes that the weevils will do their job without requiring further releases in subsequent years, though she plans to continue to monitor mile-a-minute and the weevils for some time. She is now studying other invasive plants that can be controlled by insects, including a caterpillar that feeds on swallow-wort and a weevil that eats knapweed.