Introduction – humans, nature and human nature - Ecological Applications: Toward a Sustainable World - page 15

Table 1.1 Estimated
annual costs (billions of
US dollars) associated
with invaders in the
USA. In each case, the
cost is made up of loss
and damage caused plus
dollars spent to control
the pests. Taxonomic
groups are ordered in
terms of the total costs
associated with them.
(After Pimentel et al.,
2000.)

Number of Loss and Control Total

Type of organism invaders Major culprits damage costs costs

Microbes (pathogens) > 20,000 Crop pathogens 32.1 9.1 41.2

Mammals 20 Rats and cats 37.2 NA 37.2

Plants 5,000 Crop weeds 24.4 9.7 34.1

Arthropods 4,500 Crop pests 17.6 2.4 20.0

Birds 97 Pigeons 1.9 NA 1.9

Molluscs 88 Asian clams, zebra 1.2 0.1 1.3

mussels

Fishes 138 Grass carp, etc. 1.0 NA 1.0

Reptiles, amphibians 53 Brown tree snake 0.001 0.005 0.006

NA, data not available.

(a) (b)

(c)

(a) Yellow star thistle. (© Greg Hudson,
Visuals Unlimited.) (b) Red fi re ants. (©
Visuals Unlimited/ARS.) (c) Zebra mussels.
(© Visuals Unlimited/OMNR.)