ABSTRACT
Alligator weed and water hyacinth are two of the most troublesome aquatic weeds in the southeastern United States. In order to determine the factors that separate the two weeds, two hypotheses have been formulated to evaluate the importance of water quality to the presence or absence of alligator weed and water hyacinth. The null hypothesis states that no difference in water quality is apparent among sites which have alligator weed, sites which have water hyacinth, and sites which have neither of these. The alternate hypothesis states that some factor or factors of water quality separate the species and affect their ability to colonize and compete. To test the hypotheses, water samples were taken at various randomly chosen sites. Each site was classified H, A or N. A multivariate discriminant analysis was performed to determine which water quality factors were important in separating the three groups and which factors discriminate one from the others.
