In 1988, researchers working with the United States Department of Agriculture released a small population of European flea beetles onto infested rangeland near Valley City, North Dakota, hoping the insects might help control a plant that had been quietly overrunning the Northern Great Plains for decades. That plant was leafy spurge, an aggressive Eurasian weed that had already spread across more than two million hectares of pasture and rangeland in 35 American states by the time the beetles arrived. What began as a modest, closely monitored release near two small test sites went on to seed one of the most successful biological control programs in American agricultural history, with descendants of those original beetles eventually establishing populations across the northern United States and into Canada, reducing leafy spurge cover on treated land by as much as 90 per cent within a few years.
Get breaking news anytime, anywhere. Download the TOI app now!
