Charlotte Causton

Principal Investigator - Control of the Avian Vampire Fly

Charlotte Causton trained as an entomologist and has extensive experience developing methods to manage invasive species. Her area of expertise is classical biological control for conservation and she obtained her PhD in this topic from the University of Reading and CABI. She worked for 11 years in the Andes of Venezuela, where she researched environmentally friendly techniques for managing agricultural pests and conducted research for the US Forest Service on possible candidates for use in the biological control of invasive plants in Hawaii.

Since she started working at CDF in 1997, she has been involved in numerous projects. Among them, she coordinated the first biological control program in the Galapagos against the cottony scale, Icerya purchasi, using the Australian ladybird Novius cardinalis. She also played an important role in the design and implementation of a quarantine and inspection system for the Galapagos Islands to stop the introduction of new species. Currently, she is leading projects to investigate methods to control the avian vampire fly, Philornis downsi, and the yellow paper wasp, Polistes versicolor.