Canals as invasion pathways in tropical dry forest and the need for monitoring and management

Linear infrastructure intrusions are common around the world to meet the needs of a growing and interconnected human population. The implementation of linear infrastructures involves numerous forms and mechanisms of land-use transformation that can facilitate and serve as pathways to the spread of invasive non-native species. However, the type and intensity of land transformations change over time and this can affect the frequency and intensity in which linear infrastructures route the spread of invasive species.
Here, we present results collected over five years of monitoring surveys (2015 to 2019) to assess the relationship between the construction of one of the largest canals to date in Brazil and the spread of non-native species. We studied the Integration Project of the São Francisco River (PISF) a canal fully inserted in the Caatinga biome, a tropical dry forest ecosystem for which information on invasion dynamics are little known.
Our results confirmed PISF canals served a...