DATE: March 28, 2008

CONTACT: Chuck Gresham, (843) 546-9531
cgrshm@clemson.edu

WRITER: Tom Lollis, (803) 284-3343, ext. 241
tlollis@clemson.edu

Beach vitex may be on its last legs in South Carolina

NORTH MYRTLE BEACH – A plant called beach vitex, also known as beach kudzu, may be on its last legs as a threat to native dune plants on the South Carolina coast thanks to the Carolinas Beach Vitex Task Force (CBTF) and Clemson University.

“We have cleared 96 sites and in 2008 we plan to clear another 92 sites that were injected with the herbicide Habitat in the fall of 2007,” said Chuck Gresham, faculty member at Clemson’s Baruch Institute of Coastal Ecology and Forest Science at Georgetown, at the recent annual Beach Vitex Symposium at North Myrtle Beach.

Each site cleared of vitex is replanted with native dune plants sea oats and bitter panicum, plus American beachgrass, which has been used for many years on South Carolina dunes. The largest site treated has been at Kingston Plantation, which had 1.6 acres of vitex in its landscaping.

“We’re starting to think we may be able to get rid of an invasive species in South Carolina,” said Betsy Brabson, state coordinator for the task force. A volunteer sea turtle monitor, it was Brabson who noticed vitex taking over dunes on an undeveloped beach south of an area she had been watching near Georgetown.

With help from Gresham and fellow faculty member Jack Whetstone, South Carolina Sea Grant Extension Program aquaculture specialist; Brabson and other concerned citizens; state and federal agencies; and non-profit organizations organized the South Carolina Beach Vitex Task Force in 2003 to help identify problem areas. It expanded into North Carolina in 2005 with a name change.

In February in Washington, D.C., Brabson accepted for the CBTF the 2007 Pulling Together Initiative Community Spirit Award from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, which awards 40 to 50 PTI grants each year. The task force, since 2004, has provided almost $200,000 from partners to match $157,000 in PTI funds to help with the vitex program.

Randy Westbrooks of the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Wetlands Research Center in Whiteville, N.C., told task force members that he sees three heroes in the fight against beach vitex: Brabson, Gresham and Michael Lusk, invasive species coordinator for the National Wildlife Refuge System, who was instrumental in getting grant funding for the project.

Gresham’s research established the most effective methods for eliminating vitex.

Westbrooks said that having beach vitex listed as a noxious weed is a key to continued success in controlling the plant. The listing procedure has begun in North Carolina, and he encouraged task force members to encourage Clemson’s Department of Plant Industry to do the same.

He said the task force approach to problems such as beach vitex is vital, since no government agencies are given the duty of protecting biological systems that are not related to agriculture. With luck he thinks that beach vitex can be eliminated in South Carolina as soon as 2009.

Hal Drotor, field technician at Baruch, gave a demonstration on vitex treatment and removal during the symposium, held at the North Myrtle Beach Municipal Complex.

“We cut the vine with a machete and dab on the herbicide with a sponge paint brush, wait 120 to 150 days for it to die, then cut and remove the dead material,” Drotor said. “We chip it all up and keep all the debris at a site on Baruch property.”

Many of the more than 800 sea turtle volunteers in South Carolina are involved in monitoring beaches for vitex. Clemson University, according to Gresham, surveys areas of coastline not monitored by the sea turtle volunteers.

“Constant follow-up monitoring will be required to make certain that vitex does not become re-established,” Gresham said. “It is persistent and a plant not to be trusted to do what we want.”