George P. Markin is a research entomologist who specializes in finding, testing and introducing biological control agents to control forest weeds. Beginning in 1982, he set up a program in Hawaii for biological control of invasive weeds of native rain forests. In 1995 at the request of the Washington Office, he moved to Bozeman, Montana to set up a new program to encourage and train forest range management personnel in the use of biological control and when no agents were already available, to conduct the research necessary to find and import them for weeds of the coniferous forests of the Pacific Northwest.

Ph.D. - University of California, Riverside 1967.

1995 - Present: Primary area of research is the development and implementation of biological control of weeds on national forest lands of the Pacific Northwest. Responsibilities include assisting Forest Service vegetation managers in implementation of biological control when approved agents already exist, and undertaking research to find new biological control agents for forest weeds on which no other researchers are presently working. He has programs underway to find biological control agents for Scotch broom (Cytisus scoparius), gorse (Ulex europaeus), and Rush skeletonweed (Chrondrilla juncea). His research activities include locating, organizing, and supporting foreign exploration for natural enemies of these three weeds in their homelands in Europe and Asia; importing and testing in quarantine at Bozeman, Montana the potential biological control agents found by foreign exploratory entomologists; and when testing indicates that agents are satisfactory, undertaking the review and permitting process necessary to obtain approval for their release in North America. The first agent to complete this process was a mite released on gorse on the West Coast in 1996.

1983 - 1995: Key participant in a multi-agency effort to initiate the use of biological control as a management tool in tropical forest ecosystems of Hawaii. This interagency organization targeted six weeds as key invaders threatening Hawaii's ecosystem. The resulting biological control program has resulted to date in the release of nine new biological control agents (eight insects and one pathogen) on these weeds. Preliminary evidence indicates that the biological control agents established on two of these weeds, Clidemia hirta and Ulex europaeus, are impacting the plant enough that we expect their partial-to-complete control in the foreseeable future.

Over 115 reviewed scientific papers, about half of which deal with insect biology and biological control and includes four chapters in books, and is the editor of one Forest Service manual. Annually presents three-to-five formal presentations on biological control at Forest Service, entomological meetings, and biological control of weeds meetings. See the publications section.

Member of the International Organization of Biological Control, and in 1999 helped organize the Tenth International Biological Control of Weeds Symposium held in Bozeman, Montana.