Forest Service Funds Partnerships to Address Invasive Plant Impacts in the Great Lakes Region

Release Date: 

Milwaukee, WI — The USDA Forest Service is proud to announce funding of over $880,000 in Cooperative Weed Management Area (CWMA) grants to 23 programs dedicated to controlling harmful invasive plants in the Great Lakes region. These projects are funded through the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) under an agreement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

This year, recipients within the Great Lakes basin states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio received funding ranging from $15,000 to $40,000. Each recipient provides a minimum 20% match for this funding, in collaboration with state or local partners, donors or volunteers.

Their work builds on overall GLRI restoration and protection efforts, focused on:

  • Cleaning up Great Lakes areas of concern
  • Preventing and controlling invasive species
  • Reducing nutrient runoff that contributes to harmful/nuisance algal blooms
  • Restoring habitat to protect native species
  • Implementing science-based adaptive management

Organizations implementing these targeted management plans include partnerships of federal, state and local government agencies, tribes, individuals and others that manage invasive plants across jurisdictional and ownership boundaries and work together to address the most serious threats.

“The Forest Service is proud to financially assist organizations aiming to promote watershed stability and biological diversity within the Great Lakes watershed,” said Robert Lueckel, Acting Regional Forester for the Forest Service’s Eastern Region. “By monitoring and reducing the spread of invasive plant species, CWMA grant recipients make the Great Lakes basin a better place for people, wildlife, and native plant communities.”

To learn more about CWMA recipients in your area and the Forest Service’s Great Lakes CWMA grant program, visit the CWMA website.

Funded Projects:

  • Continuing Treatments for Priority Invasive Plant Species within the KISMA Tri-County Area –Michigan: Michigan Technological University will monitor 15 GLRI-targeted and locally prioritized invasive plant species on about 25 acres of land to improve native plant habitats and resiliency.
  • Empowering Communities in Invasive Species Management – Michigan: The Grand Traverse Conservation District, partners and volunteers will treat and protect over 180 acres of high-priority invasive species in northwest lower Michigan. 
  • Huron Heartland CWMA Invasive Species Pathways Assessment – Michigan: Huron Pines will inventory motorized trails, campgrounds, and parking areas in six counties on Huron National Forest land and other adjacent public lands to identify potential invasive species pathways.
  • Protecting High Value Habitats from Invasive Species: Stopping the Spread from Transportation Corridors – Michigan: The Mason-Lake Conservation District aims to control invasive species along roadway ditches within the North Country Cooperative Invasive Species Management Area (CISMA), which have direct connections to rivers and streams, thus accelerating the spread of invasive species throughout the region.
  • Protecting Waterways within the Saginaw Bay Watershed – Michigan: This project will treat locations along waterways on state, public and private land identified by partners in the Central Michigan CISMA region that are being altered by invasive species.
  • Responding to Stiltgrass in Michigan: A Collaborative Treatment Plan – Michigan: The Stewardship Network will implement an early detection and rapid response plan to control Microstegium vimineum (stiltgrass) in Michigan, with a primary focus in Washtenaw and Lenawee Counties.
  • Restoration of Invasive Phragmites Infestations in the Barry - Calhoun - Kalamazoo (BCK) Area – Michigan: The BCK CISMA and its partners propose invasive phragmites treatment and native habitat restoration at four locations in the Barry-Calhoun region of Southwest Michigan.
  • Restoring the priority habitats of coastal Lake Huron – Michigan: The Huron Coastal CWMA will survey, report and remove at minimum 250 acres of invasive species identified as a priority from members of the CWMA Steering Committee and other partners within its collaborative.
  • St. Joseph River Inventory, Management and Treatment Project – Michigan: Southern Michigan Invasive Species Team (SMIST) CISMA of St. Joseph County Conservation District will inventory invasive species along 206 miles of the St. Joseph River, prioritizing sites based on the impact of the invasive species.
  • Survey and detection of NNIS through trail transportation in the central Upper Peninsula – Michigan: Marquette County Conservation District and the Lake to Lake CISMA will employ a seasonal field crew to map non-native invasive species (NNIS) on 206 miles of the North Country National Scenic Trail and 44 miles of the Bay de Noc Grand Island National Recreation Trail.
  • Three Shores CISMA Inland Lakes Initiative – Michigan: Chippewa Luce Mackinac Conservation District across three shore CISMAs will map 20 of Michigan’s Eastern Upper Peninsula inland lakes for top priority invasive species.
  • Managing Invasive Species and Strengthening Partnerships – Minnesota: The Cook County Invasive Team's (CCIT) project will detect and prevent non-native invasive plant (NNIP) infestations in Cook County, Minnesota, within the Lake Superior watershed.
  • Lake County Regional Coordination and Facilitation of Non-native Invasive Species – Minnesota: Lake County Soil and Water Conservation District's Lake County Invasives Team, a CWMA, and its partners will detect and manage invasive plant infestations in Lake County, Minnesota, that fall within the Lake Superior Basin subwatersheds.
  • Managing Invasive Species to Support the Cuyahoga River Area of Concern (AOC) Delisting Plan – Ohio: The Nature Conservatory, in partnership with federal, state and local agencies, and non-profits, under the Crooked River Cooperative Weed Management Agreement, will control 200 acres of invasive species within the Cuyahoga River Area of Concern.
  • Detecting and Controlling High Priority Invasive Plants in the Wisconsin Headwaters of Lake Michigan and Lake Superior – Wisconsin: The Wisconsin Headwaters Invasives Partnership CWMA will lead early detection surveys of rural roads and stream crossings, to identify high priority species and work to control them before they infest Great Lakes habitats and wetlands.
  • Door County Invasive Species Team: Strategic inventory and control of high priority invasive species in areas of high ecological importance – Wisconsin: The Soil & Water Conservation Department (SWCD) will monitor and minimize the spread of invasive species in Door County, Wisconsin by surveying alongside streams, ROWs, and private properties for high risk areas.
  • Improving Native Communities through Invasive Species Management in Central Wisconsin – Wisconsin: The Golden Sands Resource Conservation and Development Central Wisconsin Invasives Partnership project will improve wildlife habitat and water quality in areas where native plants re-populate riparian zones.
  • Invasive Plant Control and Outreach in Northeast Wisconsin – Wisconsin: The Golden Sands RC&D Northeast Wisconsin Invasive Species Coalition will organize a number of invasive plant workdays to control spotted knapweed in order to benefit a federally endangered butterfly.
  • Lakeshore Invasive Species Management Area – Wisconsin: Glacierland Resource Conservation and Development aims to reinvigorate the Lakeshore Invasive Species Management Area through collaboration with partners, invasive species education and monitoring activities, and implementing invasive species control measures.
  • NCWMA's Invasive Species Management and Monitoring Project – Wisconsin: The Northwoods Cooperative Weed Management Area will detect, monitor, and control priority invasive plants within the Lake Superior Watershed of Bayfield, Ashland, Iron, and Douglas Counties in Wisconsin.
  • Restoring Great Lakes Ecological Resiliency – Wisconsin: The Southeastern Wisconsin Invasive Species Consortium, Inc. will control non-native invasive species and restore native plant communities in 354 woodland acres in southeast Wisconsin.
  • Watershed Protection by TIP Through Invasive Species Management – Wisconsin: Lumberjack RC&D, Timberland Invasives Partnership (TIP), the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin, and the Stockbridge-Munsee Community are working in partnership to manage and prevent the spread of invasive species.
  • Wild Rivers ISC: Enhancing Ecosystems of the Menominee River Watershed through Invasive Species Detection, Education, & Control – Wisconsin: Wild Rivers Invasive Species Coalition and Dickinson Conservation District propose efforts to inventory high-traffic recreational areas to determine current distributions and control several priority invasive species.

 

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