This is a job for super weevils

A COLONY of tiny weevils have been drafted in to help efforts to tackle a 2.5-mile long tangle of invasive water plants, the Environment Agency has revealed.

The Azolla weevil (Stenopelmus rufinasus) feeds exclusively on the water fern Azolla filiculodies, a non-native species from North America which was brought to the UK in the 19th century as an ornamental plant and then grew in the wild.

Azolla started to cause a difficulties on the River Till, a tributary of the River Witham, in Lincolnshire, earlier this year.

The Environment Agency hopes the colony of beetles, which only eat water fern, will reverse the problem.