Conference a Huge Success!

The Upper Peninsula Resource Conservation and Development (UP RC&D) Council was pleased to sponsor RRIP-IT-UP's 2^nd Annual UP-wide Conference on Invasive Plants: Pieces of the Management Puzzle. RRIP-IT-UP stands for Rapid Response Invasive Plant Intervention Team for the Upper Peninsula. The event took place on November 10, 2011 in Marquette. One of the goals of the RRIP-IT-UP project is to increase the communication and collaboration of all the individuals, agencies and organizations in the region that are dealing with invasive plant issues. Even though the weather didn't cooperate and keynote speaker Kate Howe, Coordinator of the Midwest Invasive Plant Network (MIPN), only got as far as Detroit before being told she couldn't get to Marquette for 5 days, we had a great turnout. Fortunately, Carmen Chapin, who is on the MIPN board, was able to make her presentation, and did a great job.

The diversity of the groups that were represented at the conference is proof that there is an enormous amount of interest in this collaboration. Attending the conference were representative from three UP tribes (KBIC, Bay Mills, Sault Tribe), employees of three federal agencies (USFS, NPS, NRCS), numerous state agencies (MDEQ, DNR Forest Management, Wildlife, and Parks & Recreation Divisions), many of the conservation districts in the UP, four universities, all five UP cooperative weed management areas, several non-profit groups (TNC, Moosewood Nature Center, UPEC, Sierra Club, MNA, SWP), and several employees of private industry (forest industry, pesticide applicators, native seed, power company). Last, but certainly not least, there were several dedicated volunteers in the audience. There is a realization that we can all be more effective in our efforts to combat invasive plants if we work together to share information and resources. There is also a strong interest in keeping these annual UP-wide conferences going, and a committee is already beginning to plan for next year's conference.

The presentations for this year's conference are available below.