Developing a Rapid Response Plan for Didemnum : A Proposed Model Plan for Prince Edward Island

1. Locke, A., and H.A. Smith Gulf Fisheries Centre, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, P.O. Box 5030, Moncton, NB PEI Area Office, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Charlottetown, PEI “Rapid Response” is the capacity to quickly respond to an invasion in cases where prevention (of the invasion) fails. Normally, eradication is the primary goal. Other management options include containment of the population, suppression to keep its numbers below an economic or ecological threshold or slow its spread, or living with the effects of the species. The Rapid Response Plan outlines the decision-making process to select a management option and the tools to carry it out. Locke et al. developed a draft National Framework for Rapid Response to Aquatic Invasive Species which will be formally reviewed in 2008 by Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO). The Rapid Response Framework is a “cookbook” of pre-invasion planning and post-invasion action steps. Despite the “draft” status of the Framework, it has already been used in several provinces as an aid to identifying actions to be taken after the discovery of invasive marine species, although in those cases it was too late for the pre-invasion steps. The Prince Edward Island Aquatic Invasive Species Coordinating Committee (AISCC) identified the non-indigenous form of Didemnum, present in Georges Bank and Eastport, Maine, but not yet reported from Canadian waters, as a taxon for which a Rapid Response Plan should be developed. In March 2007, a workshop was held in Charlottetown, PEI, to start the development of a Rapid Response Plan for Didemnum in PEI. This is the first such plan which will be developed proactively by DFO before the detection of an invasion, and serves as the first field-test of the proposed National Framework. This poster reports on the outcomes of that workshop. Developing a Rapid Response Plan for Didemnum: A Proposed Model Plan for Prince Edward Island . .