Parks & Recreation

Duluth Invaders

Duluth Invaders is a service initiative organized by the City of Duluth to mobilize citizen volunteers to assist in controlling and removing terrestrial invasive plants, as well as restore the lands damaged by them within the City of Duluth.

These efforts will:

  1. Ensure natural beauty within the parks
  2. Foster a healthy ecosystem for native flora and fauna
  3. Prevent a single-species forest or prairie

Why are invasive species so bad?

  • Invasive species often don’t have predators, so they are free to grow uncontested.
  • They often are very adaptable to any type of habitat, growing almost anywhere there is a disturbance.
  • They grow rapidly and choke out natural vegetation of the area, this often create monocultures. 
  • They alter habitats for natural plants and animals, changing the ecosystem.
  • They are very expensive to remove and destroy, costing the United States an estimated 120 billion in damages annually.