Research Highlights - Hawaiian Rainforest Invaders
Invasions by plants, animals and insects contribute to global environmental change, but the dynamics and consequences of most invasions are difficult to assess at regional scales. The CAO is mapping the location and impacts of many highly invasive plant species across thousands of acres of Hawaiian rainforest reserves. From the air, Carnegie scientists, along with partners from the US Forest Service, State of Hawaii, and Stanford University have identified ways that the invaders transform the 3-D structure, chemistry, and biodiversity of native rainforests. Some invaders such as strawberry guava trees from Brazil shade out other plants and are destroying important native Hawaiian forests. Other invaders such as kahili ginger crawl along the forest floor and steal water and nutrients from native trees above. The CAO is demonstrating how a new airborne mapping strategy can identify and track the spread of certain invasive plant species, determine ecological consequences of their proliferation, and provide detailed geographic information to conservation and management efforts.
Images, from top to bottom:
- Dark green trees are the highly invasive strawberry guava tree from Brazil. This invasion is occurring in a remote rainforest reserve in Hawaii.
- This CAO image shows the march of invasive albizia trees (pale reds and pinks) and highly invasive strawberry guava trees (intense red) in Hawaii.
- This 3-D image shows an invasion (red-pink trees) into a protected forest reserve (blue-green trees) in lowland rainforest.
See the Image Gallery for additional, full resolution images. See the Publications section for research details.