KY FY23 Invasive Pest Outreach 5.0389.01

Invasive Pest Outreach FY23 We will use three strategies to engage and educate the public about signs and symptoms of invasive pests, pathways of movement, and ongoing survey and eradication efforts statewide and nationwide. First, we will continue and expand the citizen scientist program that we started in FY22 using PPA funding. We trained citizens to deploy spongy moth traps and, in FY22, the program was a great success with citizens setting and monitoring 281 traps. These individuals learn about invasive pests more broadly in a training session and then get hands-on experience with the spongy moth detection survey. Their participation in the survey project fosters interest and enthusiasm and will inspire them to share their experience and knowledge with others. In FY23, we will expand the program to train more groups and will hold train-the-trainer sessions for county extension agents, state parks personnel, etc. Second, we will educate county extension agents about invasive pests that threaten Kentucky, pathways by which they move, detection and eradication techniques, and our citizen scientist program. Each of Kentucky’s 120 counties has an extension office and these agents are often the first person contacted by citizens when they see something of concern. The agents must complete training hours each year and can choose from different topics. We will work with extension specialists to create invasive pest modules as part of the required yearly training for extension agents. We will provide training and educational materials to accompany the module and will create an assessment to measure the efficacy of the training. Third, we will educate the general public about invasive pests through in-person events and via our website www.UnluckyForKentucky.com. We will have booths at outreach events throughout the year and across the state. Our booths will have informational pamphlets, promotional items, pinned specimens, and examples of pest damage. We will keep track of numbers of booth visitors and will measure impact by offering a Don’t Move Firewood pledge for booth visitors to sign after we explain the pathways by which invasive pests can move. These three strategies will increase the knowledge of the public and the likelihood that they will look for and report invasive pests. We will demonstrate the effectiveness of this outreach program by keeping records of: numbers of citizens educated via the citizen scientist training, number of traps set by citizen scientists, numbers of county extension agents trained by the invasive pest module, numbers and reach of social media posts, and quantities of outreach materials developed. We will generate survey maps from the data gathered by the citizen scientists and will develop an assessment to determine the efficacy of the extension agent training module.