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USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) is celebrating the agency’s 40 th anniversary today. While APHIS’ program activities and responsibilities have grown and evolved since the Agency’s founding in 1972, the mission remains the same: serving the public by protecting the health...

Did you know USDA brings Thanksgiving dinner to our troops serving abroad ? Did you know that USDA is responsible for fabric testing , including creating flame-retardant finishes used on products like firefighters’ uniforms and military clothing and children’s pajamas? Did you know 1 in 5 Americans...

The mission of USDA-APHIS Wildlife Services is to provide expertise to resolve wildlife conflicts and allow people and wildlife to coexist. During my recent trip to South Florida I toured Homestead Airbase and learned firsthand about an extremely valuable service provided by APHIS-WS that most folks...

This year I am encouraging everyone to make the Cinco de Mayo celebration a “Citrus de Mayo” affair by celebrating citrus’ role in the holiday’s food and culture. My goal is to raise awareness of the serious threat that diseases like citrus greening pose to United States citrus. From the limes and...

Alabama conservationists are closer to regenerating a population of the threatened eastern indigo snake in the Conecuh National Forest through the release of numerous juvenile snakes on the forest. The indigo snake is North America’s largest native snake, and plays an important ecological role in...

On April 24, USDA confirmed the nation’s 4 th case of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) in an animal that was sampled for the disease at a rendering facility in central California. This animal was never presented for slaughter for human consumption, so at no time presented a risk to the food...

Imagining our communities without trees is hard to fathom. Unfortunately, there is an insect that threatens the trees we love – the Asian longhorned beetle (ALB). It’s an invasive insect that feeds on certain species of hardwood trees, eventually killing them. Since its discovery in the United...

Bringing USDA expertise into a cooperative effort with the U.S. Navy and a telecommunications company recently made flying safer for hundreds of vultures and Navy aviators near Milton, Fla.

For the past several months, USDA’s Animal Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) and its partners at the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (FDACS) have been fighting to stop the spread of the giant African snail—a nasty invasive pest that threatens Florida’s agricultural...

The Patuxent Wetlands Park is a lovely setting in Anne Arundel County, Maryland where vibrant tidal wetlands give way to the Patuxent River. It is a place where the community enjoys fishing, boating and nature. It is also the site of one of the 500 purple, prism-shaped traps hanging high in Maryland...