Invasive species

[anycade3]

Is it ok to destroy invasive species? specifically ones that harm the environment?? Living in a small town so was curious if killing things like Zebra Mussels or Asian Clams would help the ecosystem here.

[Thunderhead]

Check with your Department of Natural Resources. I know in Michigan they want us to destroy certain invasives.
I don’t know where you are.

[AdamWargon]

@mamestraconfigurata

I don’t have any real opinion on this question, but do have a couple of things to add. I’ve lived long enough to see the introduction of several invasive species, and the attempts to either eliminate them or control their spread. None have been successful.

As an example, it should have been possible to keep zebra mussels confined in Eastern Canada, but they are now common in Manitoba even though we are part of a different watershed. The general public moves around too much, and doesn’t practice good hygiene (like washing boats, not transporting wood).

Eventually, the organisms just become another part of the ecosystem. So unless there is a well organized program to eliminate a life form when it gets a toe hold in a place, I think it’s a lost cause.

@MFeaver

Native limpkins which we were told relied solely on the native Florida apple snails to thrive; the decline of the limpkin population, it was suggested, was due to the decline of the native apple snail population and the dominance of the island apple snail, a not native species (invasive).

However, I have seen limpkins thrive where there are no Florida apple snails (in SW Georgia), but where there are bountiful island apple snails. I have also seen at least one limpkin in a lake where its primary food, it seems, is the Asian clam (another non-native), as indicated by a nearby mound of Asian clam shells where it was.

@jasonhernandez74

The Asian clam is thought to have saved some endemic turtles from extinction by becoming their new prey base after native freshwater mussels became rare for other reasons.

[anycade3]

thanks, both of you

[lynkos]

Legislation differs widely, so I would strongly recommend you seek information from reliable/official sources in your area. In some places, acting on your own initiative could land you in serious trouble!
Also, although this may not be true with you and/or in the case you mention specifically, but (I speak from personal experience) it could be that the invasive in question can be confused with a similar native species, and/or that it has to be eliminated following a given protocol to prevent collateral damage to the ecosystem, or to ensure it’s definitive removal.
So knowledge first!

[agileantechinus]

It’s a very difficult question. I have been spending hours this week spraying Blackberry with a herbicide. I don’t really have much choice, they would just take over if left to their own devices, yet many birds nest in blackberry thickets. Some people would say I shouldn’t use a chemical herbicide. In many cases naturalised exotics don’t do much harm and are very difficult to control, they have just become part of the local environment. Hunters often justify their activities in terms of controlling pest populations, though there is never good evidence to support that. You just have to do the best you can and try to understand the situation you are faced with. A lot of money and effort is wasted on short term efforts to control exotics, but occasionally there are good long term results. Bear in mind that human time and geological time are quite different things.

[Thunderhead]

As long as you are doing that on your own property you may kill off whatever you choose, and most likely using whatever means you choose.
I believe the OP was looking into more public areas?

[anycade3]

yeah mostly this small town. noticed a few invasives