Vegetation and Invasive Species Impacts on Military Lands.

Effective and efficient land management is critical to critical to the modern military.  One of the Army's Force Operating Capabilities requires "coordinated access to and allocation of real estate assets" for training.  The Army Operations Field Manual also states that "training is the cornerstone of operational success."  Without effective vegetation and invasive species management on military land that operational success is hindered.  In a recent survey of Army installations, 53 stated that up to 390,000 acres of land were unusable for certain kinds/categories of training because of uncontrolled vegetation.  This represented 12% of the acreage of these installations.  Much of this was due to invasive species.  This presentation outlines the importance of vegetation to military training, to include issues of line of sight, dust management, and erosion control.  It also examines the impacts of inadequate vegetation management on training, to include inaccessibility, scheduling, and safety.  It describes some of the ongoing research by Army and the Department of Defense to prevent invasive species and manage them through research in biological and ecological control and early detection of species expansion.  It will also analyze capabilities to optimize biological, chemical, and mechanical control of invasive species.