We are excited to announce the launch of the Distribution of Troublesome U.S. Agricultural Weeds Pilot Project, which aims to leverage the knowledge of crop consultants, agronomists, and weed scientists to improve distribution maps of common and troublesome weed species in the United States.
This effort seeks to generate awareness amongst growers, crop consultants, agronomists, and industry representatives of the distribution of common and troublesome weed species, and support the efforts of Extension educators and weed scientists to track the spread of these weeds over time.
While there are some existing sources of weed distribution information, we believe that the most current information on the local distribution of weeds is held by crop consultants and agronomists and the growers they work with, and this information is relatively inaccessible.
For this project we are leveraging EDDMaps (https://www.eddmaps.org/), an existing database and mapping platform run by the Southern IPM Center and the Center for Invasive Species and Ecosystem Health at University of Georgia.
Based on both WSSA’s annual ‘Common and Troublesome Weeds Survey’ (https://wssa.net/weed/surveys/) and additional input from the project leadership team, we are starting with the following weed species:
- barnyardgrass (Echinochloa crus-gallis)
- common ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia)
- giant ragweed (Ambrosia trifida)
- horseweed (Erigeron canadensis)
- Italian ryegrass (Lolium perenne ssp. multiflorum)
- Johnsongrass (Sorghum halepense)
- kochia (Bassia scoparia)
- Palmer amaranth (Amaranthus palmeri)
- waterhemp (Amaranthus tuberculatus)
We invite interested crop consultants, agronomists, and weed scientists in the United States to join this project. To join either email one us (e-mails below), or visit the project website on EDDMaps at https://www.eddmaps.org/user/projectinfo.cfm?project=1475.
- Allison Jones, National Alliance of Independent Crop Consultants (allisonjones@naicc.org)
- Cameron Douglass, USDA Office of Pest Management Policy (cameron.douglass@usda.gov)
- Joe LaForest, University of Georgia Center for Invasive Species and Ecosystem Health (laforest@uga.edu)
- Steven Hoffman, InDepth Agronomy (steve.hoffman@indepthagronomy.com)
- Rodrigo Werle, University of Wisconsin-Madison (rwerle@wisc.edu)