Researchers find association between well pads, invasive species

In rural areas of South Texas, oil and gas pipelines, well pads and related road construction cut across miles of countryside and privately owned land. Based on years of observation, researchers have believed oil and gas development activities reduce the land’s native biodiversity and increase invasive species distribution, but they had not yet collected measurable data to support those observations. To evaluate and quantify the possible association between oil and gas development and invasive species cover, researchers from the Texas A&M Institute of Renewable Natural Resources (IRNR) sampled grass distributions in a privately owned ranch in Dimmit County. Read more at Texas Water Resources Institute…