Invasion Threatens the Beauty of Southern Blue Ridge Mountains

The Nature Conservancy Identifies Top 10 Invasive Threats to the Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment

Asheville, NC—17 May 2005—Invasive species are sweeping across the three-state Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment region, with potential to permanently alter the natural beauty and diversity of this globally important region. Often introduced for their aesthetic qualities, invasive species are animals, plants and diseases introduced into the environment that damage land and waters on which we all depend. Only development poses a greater threat to habitat loss on the planet.

“Protecting the Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment is a global priority for The Nature Conservancy,” said Kristen Austin, Southern Blue Ridge Project Director for The Nature Conservancy. “With intentional and unintentional assistance from people, these problematic invasive plants, animals and diseases are spreading at an alarming rate, infecting natural areas across the Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment. The Nature Conservancy, along with our partners, is committed to working with the Upstate community to understand invasive species so we can all address this problem.”

In the United States alone, more than 4,500 foreign species have gained a permanent foothold or taken root over the past century. All told, invasive species are estimated to cost $137 billion annually in losses to agriculture, forestry, fisheries and the maintenance of open waterways in the United States. To raise awareness about this issue, The Nature Conservancy has identified the top 10 most prevalent invasive plants, animals and diseases threatening the Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment.

Among the Top 10 list are two non-plant invasive species: the Hemlock woolly adelgid (an insect) and Sudden oak death (a fungus). The Hemlock woolly adelgid, believed to be native to Asia, is the leading threat to our land, water and quality of life in the mountains of North Carolina. This insect drains sap from hemlock shoots, causing premature defoliation, decreased tree vigor and then more than likely, death. This will lead to the loss of our Hemlock forests, which will have detrimental effects to our trout streams, recreational opportunities and neotropical migrant bird habitat. Sudden oak death is a disease that has been killing oaks in central California, poses a significant threat to our Southern Blue Ridge forests.

“When invasive species are introduced to a region, they can wreak havoc on the native plants and animals,” said Dr. John Randall, director of The Nature Conservancy’s Invasive Species Program. “Invasions are occurring around the world at an unprecedented rate and scale. We need to be active now to ensure that the natural diversity of the Southern Blue Ridge remains for future generations.”

To provide information to the community about this issue, Dr. Randall, one of the world’s leading experts on the impacts of invasive species, and Rob Sutter, Southern Conservation Ecologist for the Conservancy and expert on the flora of the Southern Blue Ridge, will be the keynote speakers at the South Carolina Native Plant Society’s May meeting in Greenville, SC on May 17. The presentation is open to the public and will address what you can do every day to help with this issue.

About the Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment
Spanning three states and encompassing 859,000 acres, the Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment contains some of the highest natural diversity of rare plants and animals found anywhere in the world. More than 300 rare plant and animal species have been identified in the Escarpment, and the escarpment contains more tree species than can be found in all of Europe. The Escarpment stretches only 85 miles long and 15 mile wide, from Hickory Nut Gorge near Asheville, North Carolina, to the Chattooga River in Georgia, where its abrupt wall of mountains captures moist Gulf air and gives the region the highest rainfall east of the Pacific Cascades. Created more than a billion years ago, the Escarpment contains more than fifty significant waterfalls – the greatest concentration of scenic waterfalls in the eastern United States, including four with drop-offs of several hundred feet.

The Nature Conservancy is actively working to protect several thousand acres along the Green River in North Carolina and near Jones Gap State Park in South Carolina. Similar efforts to protect acreage in Hickory Nut Gorge are underway, with several tracts currently under contract within this ecological hotspot, and new discussions underway to bring new public partners into conservation efforts in the area. One of the most exciting developments has been the creation of the new Silver Run Preserve, just south of Cashiers, NC. This 1,400-acre preserve includes several of the headwaters streams that form the Whitewater River, and typical of tracts along the escarpment, includes natural communities found few other places on Earth.

The Nature Conservancy is a leading international, nonprofit organization that preserves plants, animals and natural communities representing the diversity of life on Earth by protecting the lands and waters they need to survive. To date, the Conservancy and its more than one million members have been responsible for the protection of more than 14 million acres in the United States and have helped preserve more than 83 million acres in Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacific. In North Carolina, The Nature Conservancy has protected more than 575,000 acres across the state. Visit us on the Web at nature.org/northcarolina.

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