[APWG] Abandon obsolete technologies and a contest to invent those which actually work

[Craig Dremann]

Dear All,

The report that you posted from Andy Kulla from Montana, shows that the
usual methods of herbicides and burning, usually don't do anything
positive out here in the arid West regarding exotic plant management.

Professionals in Ecological Restoration discovered that fact over a
decade ago, and it is probably very difficult for public land managers
to have to retire those two ancient management tool, and start investing
money in inventing the tools that will actually work.  

I gave a talk on that issue to BLM two years ago in Monterey, that you
can read at http://www.ecoseeds.com/talk.html 

Unfortunately, we may continue to see tens to hundreds of millions of
dollars being invested by the Federal government, to try and get all the
obsolete technologies like herbicides, burning, or biological control,
to work to manage exotic plants in the arid West for many more
decades---like the current $2+ million USDA project with BLM that you
read about at 
http://www.ecoseeds.com/2.3million.html

What I'm proposing instead, for the rest of our exotic-plant management
history on public lands, is that all the Federal agencies including the
military and the Federal Highways Administration, get together to fund
an annual "Weed Contest", instead of any investmenting another dollar in
obsolete technologies like herbicides, burning, or biological control.

Each year, one or more public-lands weeds could be targeted, and the
"Weed Contest" organizers could invite all the professionals in
Ecological Restoration and all the University academics, to come and
show in small-scale test plots, how the technologies they have invented
will actually take care of the problem.  And there needs to be a
substantial prize, of course.

The Federal government already has a "Prize" type of process, for small
businesses to invent solutions for the government, which is $100,000 you
show that your solution has possibilities, and then if you prove it out,
like in small-scale test plots---then you're given a Phase 2 grant of
$750,000 to show that it will work on a large-scale.  What the
government expects you will have developed at the end of Phase 2, is
technologies refined enough, that a patent can be filed for the new
invention.  

I think if the different Federal land management agencies annually
ganged-up on a single widespread weed species that is infesting
say---BLM lands, and US Forest Service lands, and Military lands, and
Federal Highways---then those agencies could get someone to jointly
invent the most efficient methods to manage that weed, by offering a
prize through a "Weed Contest".

Sincerely,  Craig Dremann, Redwood City, California (650) 325-7333