Monitoring weed populations and the impact of biological control agents on those populations is an essential component of a biological control program.

Data from monitoring should be an integral part of any particular program by guiding prioritisation of potential agents, and guiding decisions on further releases of the same agent or the need for alternative agents or alternative control measures. In the longer term, monitoring provides a basis for evaluating success or failure and possible explanations for those outcomes. Data demonstrating success is necessary to convince governments and funding agencies that biological control is a valid approach to weed control, and that funding should be made available for control of other weeds.

Within the resources available, biological control workers should be as rigorous and quantitative (i.e. scientific) as possible. Some workers have described biological control of weeds as more a craft than a science. While this seems a harsh judgement, biological control must certainly become more exacting if it is to mature as a science. Further data from rigorous case studies will form a basis for further development of the theoretical basis for biological control of weeds.

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