The Book

Part I.

Introduction: The Invasive Species Challenge

Using This Book: A brief explanation of how to use the identification key and how to find more information about species that interest the reader.

Chapter 1. The Aliens Landed Long Ago and Keep Arriving: A definition and introduction to why, in some areas of wild America, over 70% of the plants are not natives but invited and uninvited immigrants.

Chapter 2. Invasives Changing Wild America: What immigrant plants have done to and for their new land. A brief survey of the major hotspots and critical problems. An example would include the increased frequency of range fires caused the spread of cheatgrass in Utah and Colorado.

Chapter 3. Managing the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: A primer on the basic approaches to controlling and resolving problems from prevention to eradication.

Chapter 4. A Quick Key to Identifying Major Species of Invasive Plants: A step by step guide for the user with the familiar biology key format.

Part II. A Field Guide To Individual Species – New in the third edition is an Alert List, with brief descriptions of a selection of newly emerging invasive plants from different regions. For more established species, each plant, sometimes accompanied by closely related plants, has two or more pages. Pages show pictures of the plant with its most identifiable and typical features. The pages have information under the following topics:

  • Name and Family (the Latin and common names of the plant and its family and other plants that might be confused with it)
  • Identifying Characteristics
  • Habitat and Range (in the United States and Canada)
  • What it Does in the Ecosystem (Competition, Interactions, Results)
  • How It Came to North America
  • Management (methods of control)
  • For More Information (references for this species)

Part III. More Information- A short, annotated bibliography of the most accessible and useful articles, books and Internet sites. We recommend Internet sites because they tend to be always up to date and changing with new knowledge.

  • Bibliography
  • Glossary
  • Photo Credits
  • Index