**NISC Agencies Team Up to Control the Spread of Cactus Moth**

Washington, D.C., July 19, 2005 --- National Invasive Species Council
(NISC) member agencies are gearing up to handle the potential spread of
an invasive species: the cactus moth. In a race against time, the U.S.
Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection
Service (APHIS) has joined forces with the USDA's Agricultural Research
Service (ARS) and the U.S. Department of the Interior's (DOI) U.S.
Geological Survey (USGS), among others, to prevent the westward spread
of the cactus moth.

As a natural feeder on prickly pears (*Opuntia* species) the
caterpillars of this moth are capable of destroying plants and
populations of these plants. If the moth spreads to western U.S. desert
ecosystems and Mexico, the heart of prickly pear diversity, 80+ native
*Opuntia* species could be affected, threatening important sources of
food, medicine, and emergency fodder. In arid regions, the *Optunia*
cacti play key roles in ecosystem processes and soil conservation.

Throughout 2005, researchers are conducting a large-scale sterile insect
technique (SIT) validation study on barrier islands in Florida and
Alabama to determine whether the cactus moth's western movement can be
halted. Believed to be the most promising control method to date, the
SIT involves the release of mass-reared sterile moths to limit the
reproductive capability of healthy females.

ARS also began distributing the experimental sex lure for use in traps
to APHIS and cooperators in Alabama, Arizona, California, Florida,
Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico, and Texas. APHIS' Plant Protection
and Quarantine Program is testing the use of remote sensing technology
for finding host plants along coastal areas and barrier islands and is
developing software applications to use with handheld units for
collecting field monitoring and spatial data to be entered into the
National Agricultural Pest Information System (NAPIS).

APHIS, ARS, and USGS are also working with Mississippi State
University's Georesources Institute (MSU-GRI) to set up a monitoring
network for federal or state managed lands such as wildlife refuges,
national parks and seashores, as well as lands managed by
non-governmental organizations. Currently, over 400 sentinel sites have
been established on public and private lands in the Carolinas and the
Gulf Coast Regions for tracking the spread the pest. The ultimate goal
is to set up sentinel sites throughout the potential ecological range of
the pest---from North Carolina to California.

APHIS has partnered with the state departments of agriculture in the
southern United States to survey nurseries and homeowner properties for
cacti infested by the cactus moth. These surveys will monitor prickly
pear populations on lands managed by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
(USFWS), National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Forest
Service (FS), and Department of Defense (DOD), and also land managed by
the Nature Conservancy and master gardeners under USDA's Cooperative
State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSREES).

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So serious a threat is the cactus moth that APHIS and its partners are
not only working to control populations already established in the
United States, but APHIS also prohibits the movement of cactus plants
and cactus parts from Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands to the mainland
to prevent further introductions of the pest into the country. USDA
requires that all plants, including cacti, imported into the country for
propagation be accompanied by a health certificate and inspected at a
USDA APHIS plant inspection station where plant material found to be
infested by the cactus moth is fumigated, destroyed, or returned to its
country of origin.

The cactus moth, *Cactoblastis cactorum*, proved to be a successful
agent for the biological control of invasive *Opuntia* species in
Australia in the 1920's and in other places where these cacti are not
endemic. The moth is native in the South American countries of
Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay.

Prickly pear cacti are popular in residential and commercial landscapes
throughout the southwest United States and Mexico. Additionally there is
widespread and valuable commercial and traditional use of the plants in
Mexico. *Opuntia* production of food for humans and livestock are the
major uses. It is estimated that 2% of the value and production from
agriculture in Mexico is from *Opuntia.* Widespread invasion by this
moth could also lead to extensive destruction of natural *Opuntia*
populations that serve as food for wildlife such as deer, javelina,
rodents, and coyotes. Birds use prickly pears as nesting sites.

The cactus moth was introduced to the Island of Nevis in 1957, where it
later dispersed, either naturally or by unrecorded introductions, to
other Caribbean islands including Hispaniola, the Bahamas, Puerto Rico
and Cuba. Discovered for the first time in the Florida Keys in 1989, the
moth has since eaten its way up the eastern seaboard to Bull Island,
S.C., and along the Gulf Coast to a barrier island in Alabama. Moving at
a rate of approximately 100 miles annually since 2000, the moth is
expected to reach the Texas border by 2007 if no effective control
method is implemented.

All the Federal agencies mentioned in this document are members of NISC.
NISC is a cabinet level council established by Executive Order in 1999
to provide leadership and to ensure complimentary, cost-efficient and
effective federal activities regarding invasive species. Council members
include three co-chairs: the Secretaries of the Interior, Agriculture,
Commerce; and the Secretaries of State, Defense, Homeland Security,
Treasury, Transportation, Health and Human Services, as well as the
Administrators of the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Agency
for International Development, National Aeronautics and Space
Administration and the U.S Trade Representative. More information on
NISC is online at http://www.invasivespecies.gov. More information on
the cactus moth programs can be found online at
<http://www.aphis.usda.gov/ppq/ep/emerging_pests/cactoblastis/index.html>
and http://www.gri.msstate.edu/research/cmdmn/.

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***[Note to Stakeholders:]{.underline}*** Stakeholder announcements and
other NISC information are available on the Internet at
<http://www.invasivespecies.gov/>. For additional information on this
topic, contact Anna Cherry at (202) 354-1891 or
<anna_cherry@ios.doi.gov>