Tag: Texas

U.S. Forest Service & the University of Texas at San Antonio

by Sarah Farmer, SRS Science Delivery  • 
A recent agreement between the U.S. Forest Service Southern Research Station (SRS) and the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) will provide funding to support the newly established Educating Youth in Environmental Science Program (EYES). SRS is contributing $24,000 towards the program, which will provide environmental learning opportunities for children in San Antonio, Texas. Ultimately, the…  More 

Invasive Tallowtree Widespread in the Mississippi Alluvial Valley and Gulf Coast

by Maureen Stuart, SRS Science Delivery Group  • 
Nonnative, invasive plant species pose a threat to forest resources throughout the South. Increasingly, nonnative plants infiltrate landscapes, eroding and replacing native plant communities. This can have irreversible and degrading effects on critical, human-sustaining ecosystems. Tallowtree (Triadica sebifera) is one of the most pervasive exotic tree species in the South and is known to replace entire stands…  More 

In a Paradox, Good News for City Frogs

by Zoё Hoyle, SRS Science Delivery Group  • 
In a world rapidly losing its species diversity, amphibians have the highest rate of extinction among vertebrates. Although the usual culprits of habitat loss and human incursion play a major role, a fungus called Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) that causes an often fatal skin disease in amphibians has played a major role in the decline or extinction of about…  More 

New Tool for Untangling the Loblolly Pine Genome

by Sarah Farmer, SRS Science Delivery Group  • 
Plucking a chromosome out of a single cell is an intricate business. But that’s exactly what U.S. Forest Service Southern Research Station (SRS) scientists and partners at Texas A&M University will be able to do with a new laser capture microdissection microscope. The microscope has a laser beam 10 times thinner than a human hair,…  More 

Amazing Town Ants Arrive in Shreveport

by Zoe Hoyle, SRS Science Communications  • 
The U.S. Forest Service recently installed a diorama called The Amazing Town Ant” at the Louisiana State Exhibit Museum (LSEM) in Shreveport, Louisiana. Researchers and staff from the Forest Service Southern Research Station (SRS) Insects, Diseases, and Invasive Plants unit in nearby Pineville worked together to build a mock town ant colony, a complicated structure which…  More