>  A few years ago when the govt. had an eradication plan


> The psyllid Aphalara itadori, a sap-sucking insect native to Japan, is currently the only biocontrol agent for knotweeds.  A. itadori has been released in the U.K. and Canada, but establishment success has been variable with no obvious impact on Japanese knotweed in the field.  A. itadori was officially approved for release in the US on March 20th, 2020.  Field releases in New York (and other states in the US) have occurred in June 2020 to assess performance of A. itadori.  Due to the difficulties in establishing this species and the limited impact observed, re-distribution efforts will only occur if the species shows promise in field tests.

https://www.nyisri.org/research/biological-control/biocontrol-updates-resources/

> Here, we predict climate suitability envelopes for three target species of knotweed in Europe and two target species of knotweed in North America and compare these suitability estimates for each of these species to the source localities of each A. itadori strain.

> As part of the review prior to introduction in North America, climate suitability models for the Kyushu strain and the Hokkaido strains were developed using the software program CLIMEX (Hearne Software, Melbourne, Australia). These models predicted a strong climate match for both the Kyushu and Hokkaido strains to potential release locations across North America (Grevstad et al., 2012). However, despite this predicted climate match, there have been no documented accounts of establishment of this species anywhere it has been released.

Andersen JC, Elkinton JS. Climate suitability analyses compare the distributions of invasive knotweeds in Europe and North America with the source localities of their introduced biological control agents. Ecol Evol. 2023 Sep 12;13(9):e10494. 
doi: 10.1002/ece3.10494. PMID: 37706162; PMCID: PMC10495814.

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