The increased incidence of introduced plant pests and pathogens into Scotland in recent decades has triggered significant responses within the agricultural, horticultural and forestry sectors, with many resources available for stakeholders related to pests relevant to their sectors. However, the natural environment sector has lagged behind in this process. Conservation efforts (e.g., relocations, translocations, habitat creation, and habitat restoration) rarely consider biosecurity in a meaningful way because information is often not easy to find, understand and implement. It is therefore a daunting task for those not trained in plant pathology and entomology to assess the pest risks associated with the species that they are working on.
RBGE therefore works closely with stakeholders carrying out work in the wider environment to understand how plant pest and disease information can be produced and presented in a way that is relevant and useful to practitioners.
Working with the Scottish Plant Health Centre, we produced a Biosecurity Best Practice Guide for Conservation which provides information on how to reduce the risks of the inadvertent introduction of plant pests and diseases whilst carrying out conservation work.
This work is currently being developed further to produce a resource which enables a practitioner or land manager to develop their own plant health biosecurity plan. As a practitioner works through this process, the biosecurity risk is assessed and understood without the need for an expertise in plant pests. This approach has the benefit of also capturing any unknown pests that are yet to be encountered (e.g., a novel pathogen species within the growing media of plants being planted). This current work is funded by the Scottish Plant Health Centre.
Useful further information:
Plant Health and the Natural Environment Fellowship carried out by Ruth Mitchell (James Hutton Institute) and funded by the Plant Health Centre
The UK Plant Health Risk Register
Defra’s Plant Health Information Portal
Tree Alert for reporting tree health issues to Forest Research
Observatree – become a tree health citizen scientist!