Source(s):
Brian Scully scully@ifas.ufl.edu, 772-468-3922 ext. 112
Ron Cave rdcave@ifas.ufl.edu 772-468-3922 ext. 145
Bill Overholt waoverholt@ifas.ufl.edu 772-468-3922 ext. 143
FORT PIERCE, Fla.—Florida Commissioner of Agriculture Charles Bronson and University of Florida President Bernard Machen participated Friday in dedication ceremonies for a new $3.8 million Biological Control Research and Containment Laboratory at UF’s Indian River Research and Education Center in Fort Pierce.
“This lab will be a vital part of Florida’s future,” said Bronson. “Floridians should recognize the positive impacts that biological control will have on their environment and support the work that will take place in this lab to minimize the need for pesticide use, and reclaim our natural landscapes and agricultural lands from invasive pests and plants.”
State Sen. Ken Pruitt, R-Port St. Lucie, who spearheaded efforts to obtain funding for the new facility, provided the dedicatory address during the ceremony. Roland Daniels, a member of the UF Board of Trustees, dedicated the building where scientists will study invasive plants that consume an estimated 1.5 million acres in Florida and non-native insects that devour crops, ornamentals and native flora.
Richard Jones, interim vice president for UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS), presided over the ceremony and accepted the building for UF/IFAS. Machen accepted the building for the university; Bronson accepted it for the state’s $62 billion agricultural industry. And Brian Scully, professor and director of the Fort Pierce center, accepted the building on behalf of faculty, staff and students at the center.
“Florida agriculture loses an estimated $10 million annually to invasive plants,” Scully said. “In 2000, the state spent $90.8 million to control these invasive plants. Losses due to invasive species are having a negative impact on tourism, conservation, food production, water management, water sports, health and other sectors of the state’s economy.
“I applaud Sen. Pruitt and the efforts of our legislative delegation for their diligence on behalf of UF/IFAS. The research conducted at our new Biological Control Research and Containment Laboratory will benefit Floridians and their environment,” Scully said.
Ronald Cave, an assistant professor of entomology who will conduct research on invasive insects at the new facility, said many of Florida’s most serious pests in crops and landscapes are not native to Florida. He is working on the invasive Mexican bromeliad weevil, Metamasius callizona, which is destroying Florida’s native bromeliads.
Cave is conducting experiments with the weevil’s natural enemies, leading to the eventual release of a beneficial insect that will control the weevil pest — a process that occurs naturally in the weevil’s native environment. Another project involves the control of an Asian scale that is destroying cycads, a popular Florida landscape plant.
“This facility is a critical part in the process of finding and introducing to Florida good bugs that will control the bad bugs,” Cave said.
Bill Overholt, an assistant professor of entomology at the center who conducts research on invasive plants, said, “according to the Florida Exotic Pest Plant Council, more natural areas, groves and pastures are lost to invasive plants annually than to development.”
He is conducting research to control the air potato, Dioscorea bulbifera, an invasive African vine that is a menace to Florida’s natural hammocks and pastures. He is searching for potential biological control agents in collaboration with scientists in Ghana and Uganda. Overholt also is working with a geneticist at Florida Atlantic University to identify the plant’s origin.
Another project at the center’s new laboratory will target an invasive South American aquatic grass that is threatening Florida wetlands. Overholt is working with Jim Cuda, an associate professor in the UF/IFAS entomology and nematology department in Gainesville, to develop biological control agents for the Brazilian peppertree, Schinus terebinthifolius, one of the state’s most troublesome invasive plants. They anticipate releasing the first biological control agent for Brazilian peppertree later this year.
The Fort Pierce laboratory will be one of three biological control containment facilities in Florida. The lab was authorized by the Florida Legislature to contain, evaluate and release host-specific organisms for biological control of invasive plants and arthropods. The facility will be regulated by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.
The 17,000-square-foot facility includes two sections, one for quarantine and another for nonquarantine. The quarantine section has two laboratories, one for arthropods and another for invasive plants, plus six greenhouses, a maximum-security laboratory, a fumigation room and six climate-controlled rooms for rearing biological control agents. In the nonquarantine section are two additional laboratories, a conference room, a camera room and seven offices.
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