"There are so many stories of exotic species that come here and this is the only one with a beautiful success story, said Matt Albright, assitant to field station director Dr. Willard Harman.

Purple loosestrife is a non-native plant that has established itself around the shoreline of the lake and can be found throughout the countryside. The perennial wetland plant was introduced from Europe in the 1800s in the ballast of ships and was later intentionally transported inland by settlers who valued the plant for its ornamanteal beauty and supposed medicinal properties.

When it made its way to this country, its natural predators did not make the same journey. Free from predation, loosestrife's ability to squeeze out native plant life, coupled with a single plant's capability of producing over two million seeds per year has resulted in vast single-species stands.

In 1996, with the help of the Lake and Valley Garden Club and Cornell University, the Biological Field Station introduced 100 leaf-eating beetles of the species Galerucella. The beetles are natural predators of the loosestrife, but before introducing them, they were studied for more than 10 years to make sure they too would not become a problem.

In the first years after their introduction, Albright said the beetles didn't seem to have a pronounced affect of the loosestrife. During monitoring last year, they began to see a larger population of beetles and by the fall some patches of loosestrife had been defoliated.

This spring, the beetles were back in droves and attacked the loosestrife without mercy. Now, Albright said, the loosestrife in Goodyear Swamp is dead and the beetles have dispersed, seeking another stand of their favorite meal. The beetles tend to stay in one spot until the food source is depleted. Once they run out of food, they can travel up to 850 meters away to locate more loosestrife.

Albright said the beetles are fanning out from the swamp and had been found a half-mile away .

Summer field station intern Sarah Groff, of Cooperstown, was out monitoring their travels last Thursday afternoon and said she had found them as far away as Springfield Landing.

With the loosestrife out of the way, Albright said native plants are already making a comeback.

As a member of the Lake and Valley Garden Club, Joyce Barthold worked with the field station on the organization's funding of an intern to monitor the beetles when they were first introduced to the swamp in 1996.

"It's been quite successful," she said last week. "We were very happy to work with the Biological Field Station to help make it possible to introduce the beetles and eradicate the purple loosestrife," she said.