An occurence of Cyperus esculentus in Luxembourg has been reported by a horticultural company in Troisvierges and was confirmed by Jean-Paul Wolff (ATEMO) on 27 August 2024. This is to be seen as the first documented observation of the species in Luxembourg. Tigernut grass is known as an agricultural pest in Switzerland and elsewhere. It reproduces and spreads mainly by root nodules and can lead to considerable yield losses in arable and vegetable farming. The invasive weed has a very high propagation potential. Consequently, every effort should be made to prevent its spread. The potentially concerned stakeholders must be made aware of this problem so that they can intervene at an early stage if necessary.
C. esculentus in Troisvierges (JP Wolff – ATEMO, 27.08.2024)
In June 2024, the Ministry of the environment, climate and biodiversity published the National Strategy for Invasive Alien Species. This strategy was drawn up by the Nature and Forestry Administration (ANF), in collaboration with a number of stakeholders, with the aim of preventing the introduction, establishment and management of these species through appropriate measures. The effectiveness of this strategy will be enhanced by the active participation of various stakeholders, including public authorities, local authorities, biological stations, hunters, fishermen, gardeners, landscapers and the general public.
To achieve this objective, the ANF is focusing on raising public awareness and getting the public actively involved in identifying and reporting IAS. The aim is to control their spread in the natural environment, in order to minimise their negative impact on biodiversity, ecosystem services, human health and the economy.
The Ministry of Health informs that eggs of the invasive Asian tiger mosquito Aedes albopictus have been detected near Capellen (Municipality of Mamer) in the week of 17-23 July 2023.
In the next few days, the Luxembourg authorities, with the support of an expert, will assess the situation and take all necessary actions.
In order to address the problem of how and where to dispose of green waste resulting from measures to manage invasive alien species, to show potential disposal routes and to bring together the various people and organisations involved, the Nature and Forest Agency – Arrondissement Centre-Est, the Parc naturel de l’Our and the Natur- & Geopark Mëllerdall have organised the symposium “Management of invasive alien plants and disposal of green waste” on 10 May 2023 in Consdorf. The presentations given by the various experts can be downloaded from this link.
The atlas contains an updated map of the invasive East Asian bush or rock pool mosquitoAedes japonicus.
Schaffner F., A. Weigand & C. Ries, 2023. – Atlas and catalogue of the mosquitoes (Diptera, Culicidae) of Luxembourg. Ferrantia 87, Musée national d’histoire naturelle, Luxembourg, 117 p. [PDF 5.2 MB]
The Atlas of the Mosquitoes of Luxembourg has just been published in the Ferrantia series of the National Museum of Natural History and describes 28 species (31 taxa) of culicides found in the Grand Duchy.
Mosquito-borne diseases such as chikungunya, dengue, Usutu or West Nile, have come back to the forefront in both human and animal health. To prevent outbreaks, it is necessary to acquire a solid knowledge of the mosquito fauna in the considered area. Therefore, and since the mosquito fauna of Luxembourg was only partially known, we suggested the construction of the first comprehensive mosquito diversity and distribution database for the Grand Duchy as a base for an atlas. This atlas of the mosquitoes of Luxembourg assembles a taxonomic list and species distribution maps.
The Atlas was developed in the framework of the MosquitoLUX (2019-2022) project implemented under the auspices of the Fondation faune-flore at the Scientific Research Centre of the National Museum of Natural History in Luxembourg. The Fondation faune-flore was the host institution and administrative manager of the project.
Funding consortium :
• 50%: National Museum of Natural History, Departments of Ecology and Zoology
• 25%: Ministry of Environment, Climate and Sustainable Development
• 25%: Directorate of Health
Page content last updated on 2023-03-27. Last proofread by Caroline Grounds on 2023-03-27.
The Directorate General for Environment of the EU has published an introduction to the 88 invasive alien species of Union concern. This brochure presents, at a glance, the currently listed invasive alien species of Union concern, offering brief, non-technical and informal summaries of each of the 88 species. This includes dedicated descriptions of their main biological and ecological features, along with information on their origin, present distribution in the EU, pathways of introduction into the EU, how they threaten European native biodiversity, and which management measures are currently available to mitigate their impacts.
This publication has been produced under the supervision of IUCN within the framework of contract No. 09.0201/2021/856079/SER/ENV.D.2 “Technical and Scientific support in relation to the Implementation of Regulation 1143/2014 on Invasive Alien Species”.
Brundu, Giuseppe, Katie E Costello, Gwen Maggs, Chiara Montagnani, Ana L Nunes, Jan Pergl, Jodey Peyton, Peter Robertson, Helen Roy, Riccardo Scalera, Kevin Smith, Wojciech Solarz, Elena Tricarico & Johan van Valkenburg, 2022. An introduction to the invasive alien species of Union concern. Version 2022. 187 p. Euopean Commission, Environment.
The Ministry of Health informs that a population of the invasive Asian tiger mosquito Aedes albopictus has been detected at two locations in the territory of the Commune of Roeser. This first appearance of the tiger mosquito in the Grand Duchy has been confirmed by an international expert in the field. According to current information, this is a limited phenomenon. The tiger mosquito does not move very far and usually does not travel more than a hundred metres from its birthplace.
In the next few days, the Luxembourg authorities, with the support of an expert, will assess the situation, as well as set up a prevention plan and a surveillance and eradication system. The use of insecticides is currently under consideration. However, eradication would be mainly through the elimination of potential habitats.
The first observation of Lysichiton americanus in Luxembourg has been documented by C. Wolff via iNaturalist on 31st May 2022 and was confirmed by M. Oly on 2nd June in the Mamer valley close to Kopstal.
In 2022, the Luxembourg Nature and Forestry Administration published a poster to help differentiate between the Asian Black Hornet (Vespa velutina nigrithorax) and the Native Hornet (Vespa crabro).
Since 2021-07-14, an alert system concerning iNaturalist neobiota observations from Luxembourg has been operational. Paul Braun, digital curator at the Luxembourg National Museum of Natural History, has implemented a Python code executed every day at 12:00 CET (= 13:00 local time) which sends an email alert message to key persons in charge of neobiota early detection and surveillance in Luxembourg. Independently from their quality grade, all observations since the day before 00:00 CET until the current day 12:00 CET are compiled and sent to , and thereafter dispatched to a selection of key persons. We chose 12:00 CET to enable a rapid response in case of observations of important species occur on the current morning. Unfortunately, the iNaturalist API does not give the option to choose precise periods for data extraction, which results in an overlap of the periods covered by the alert messages.
If interested, other member states of the European Union are welcome to obtain the code in order to set up a similar alert system for their country. The contact email address is .
Recommendations to iNaturalist: it would be useful to implement the following in future versions of the API:
enable the selection of a specific set of fields needed for a query (currently only complete data sets can be selected, which causes transfer of high data volumes and has a negative impact on climate and environment);
enable precise periods for observation queries.
Example of an iNaturalist alert message
iNaturalist Neobiota Luxembourg update 2021-07-26
9 neobiota species occurrence records have been updated or added in the Neobiota Luxembourg project on iNaturalist.LU since: 2021-07-25
Please help validate neobiota species observations on iNaturalist.LU here.
The Neobiota Luxembourg project on iNaturalist.LU can be found here.
The data in this mail was obtained at 13h00 2021-07-26 using the following iNaturalist API link:
https://api.inaturalist.org/v1/observations?project_id=17708&updated_since=2021-07-25&per_page=100&order=desc&order_by=observed_on
An alert system for neobiota observations recorded in the national database on natural heritage Recorder-Lux has been operational since 2019. It triggers an alarm message as soon as an observation is entered in data.mnhn.lu or uploaded to the Recorder-Lux database. It was implemented by Armand Turpel.
Example of a Recorder-Lux alert message
Here are your latest messages from MNHN Indicia Warehouse
Survey
Date
Taxon
Spatial Ref.
Recorded by
Email
Record Status
Verified By
General Recording
03/07/2021
Procyon lotor
61817, 92092
Roland Proess
Pending verification
Thus, most neobiota observations from Luxembourg will trigger an alarm in a timely manner. However, a small gap remains: the observations of invasive alien bird species via the database of the Centrale Ornithologique du Luxembourg (COL) do not yet trigger an alarm in a timely manner. This currently concerns the following 4 bird species: Mandarin duck (Aix galericulata), Egyptian goose (Alopochen aegyptiaca), Canada goose (Branta canadensis) and Rose-ringed parakeet (Psittacula krameri).
Posted by C. Ries.
Page content last updated on 2021-08-16. Last proofread by Caroline Grounds on 2021-08-16.
The first observation of Lysichiton americanus in Luxembourg has been documented by C. Wolff via iNaturalist on 31st May 2022 and was confirmed by M. Oly on 2nd June in the Mamer valley close to Kopstal.
