"It was a wonderful experience interacting with you and appreciate the way you have planned and executed the whole publication process within the agreed timelines.”
Subrat SaurabhAuthor of Kuch Woh Pal
This guide is motivational and inspiring to the students, weed control managers, communities and others. With great effort, the author describes the weed and weed characters in simpler terms to reach the common people. Eight aquatic invasive weeds have been prohibited in Botswana and their movement within the country is restricted as per the Aquatic Weed (Control) Act of 1986, Botswana. The readers draw attention to how these weeds can be identified in the field and how they can be managed with integrated control measures.
With the information presented, we all need to cultivate feelings of protecting our waters and wetlands so that the integrity of the ecosystems is restored. Fears are spread too generously about the threat of aquatic weeds, but there are well-practiced norms, laws and methods available to manage them. The strategies and goals of the Aquatic Weed Control practiced in wetlands of Botswana to manage the weeds and the results obtained from the program can provide confidence in weed control programs for several countries.
It is set out how natural selection underlies the great similarities between species and how, when species are isolated as invasive, they become different. With this principle, the author presents, through natural measures, how evolutionary changes can occur in a system where the weeds are controlled.
CN. Kurugundla
Dr. Chandraskara Naidu Kurugundla is a multi-disciplinary professional. He obtained his M. Sc. in plant sciences and Ph.D. in experimental crude oil pollution on plants, in India. His specializations include plant physiology, biochemistry, taxonomy, anatomy, floristic studies, alien invasive weeds, ecology, environmental and water quality studies, pollution and lake/wetland restorations. He taught for 16 years from 1981 and retired as the head of the Department of Botany in Sir Theagaraya College, Univesity of Madras, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, before taking up an assignment in Botswana as the chief botanist and aquatic invasive plant specialist.
Dr. Kurugundla was selected by the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS), the Republic of Botswana, from India in August 1997 to undertake a program geared towards the protection of Botswana wetlands from invasive weeds and pollution. He served as the head of the Aquatic Vegetation Control (AVC) Unit at DWS for 21 years. Dr. Kurugundla has published more than 25 research papers including book chapters in international peer-reviewed journals.
His contributions are achieving the control and management of Salvinia weed and eradication of water lettuce in Botswana wetlands; developing the systematic water quality monitoring program for the Okavango-Kwando-Linyanti-Chobe rivers and Limpopo basin; developing the concept of the partitioning of flows in the major distributaries of the Okavango Delta; working as a focal officer and in-house consultant for the Okavango Delta Management Plan (ODMP), Transboundary Diagnostic Analysis-Strategic Action Plan (TDA-SAP) project, Biokavango project, Eco-Health project and UNESCO-World Heritage project for the Okavango Delta.
