Call for immediate measures to curb its growth before it start creating havoc on Indian agricultural fields
When researchers from Shivaji University in Kolhapur, Maharashtra, during a survey of plants variety at the agricultural fields in drier parts of Karnataka's Belgavi district stumbled upon an exotic weed 'Ethulia gracilis Delile', they panicked.
They had reasons. This was for the first time that a new weed 'Ethulia gracilis Delile' of the Asteraceae family was recorded which has a history of propagating easily and fastly in all habitats negatively affecting native flora, crop production and human health as well.
The weed was originally known to be distributed in North Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda and China. However, it has now spread its tentacles in India too, noted the researchers in their study published in the latest issue of the Current Science.
However, what is a matter of serious concern is that the species has been recorded for the first time from India and it is unknown how it got introduced here, said the researchers even as they called for immediate measures to curb its growth before it start creating havoc on Indian agricultural fields.
The second largest angiosperm family after Orchidaceae, many species of Asteraceae are weeds in cultivated fields as well as forest areas. Some of them are aggressive invasive weeds and can seriously affect the native or local plant biodiversity, human health and crop productivity, said the team of researchers comprising Jagdish Dalavi, Sneha Bramhadande, Chirag Narayankar, Suraj Patil, Shrirang Yadav from Department of Botany, Shivaji University in Kolhapur.
Hence, this weed should be eliminated at the earliest, they maintained.
India is already battling with plethora of alien plant species that is threatening country's biodiversity, accounting for 8 per cent of the global biodiversity existing in only 2.4 per cent land area of the world.
According to World Conservation Monitoring Centre (WCMC), 1,604,000 species have been described at the global level.. According to reports, the number of flowering plant species endemic to the present political boundaries of India is 4,900 out of a total of 15,000, i.e. 33 per cent. India is an important center of agri-biodiversity having contributed 167 species to the world agriculture and homeland for 320 species of wild relatives of crops.
A latest Government report has focused on 173 species of invasive alien plants in India. These include the most serious invasives, such as Alternanthera philoxeroides, Cassia uniflora, Chromolaena odorata, Eichhornia crassipes, Lantana camara, Parthenium hysterophorus, Prosopis juliflora and others.