Have you ever been asked, or have you ever thought: Why might having some species that aren’t normally found in a place create a problem for nature? Can this be the case for both plants and animals?

Remember back in my first dispatch to you, when the problem of the hyacinths in Lake Ravelobe was introduced. (See Madagascar Research & Conservation post.)

We’ve been working with the local park service (called Madagascar National Parks) and other partners to come up with potential solutions. The first step is, of course, removing as many hyacinths as we can. As the easiest way to do this is by hand, we’ve coordinated with a local “Friends of the Lake” association and additional people living here to recruit and pay for pulling the hyacinths out of the water from the banks. The park service’s tractor will then take the loads and loads of the pulled plants away for disposal. This way, not only do we have conservation action to help the ecosystem here, the local economy gets a boost, too!

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