Paspalum paniculatum L.

Code

PASPA

Growth form

grass

Biological cycle

vivacious

Habitat

terrestrial

Mayotte : Paspalum paniculatum flowers and fruits all year round.

Paspalum paniculatum is a vivacious species. It mainly spreads by seed and by splitting of the clumps during cultivation work.

Characters to distinguish several Paspalum species
 

Comoros: Paspalum paniculatum is a species present in older plantations.
Madagascar: Common in humid areas of forest (eastern slope) and on the plateau. It prefers slightly shady stations. It thrives in fallows and extensive crops on forest clearing where soils are quite deep and rich (low slope terrace, alluvial plain, damp lowlands).
Mauritius: weed very common, especially in humid and very humid areas. It grows on roadsides, in savannas and in cultivated fields.
Mayotte: Paspalum paniculatum is a common cryptogenic species in secondarized sites of hygrophilous and mesophilous regions. It likes shaded sites such as forest edges, paths, agroforests, and is able to vegetate in open sites such as roadsides, crops, pastures and recently cleared plots.
Reunion: This plant likes lightly shaded moist places. In Reunion, it is found in windy regions, both on the coast and at altitude up to 1000 m. In the downwind area, it is very rare on the coast but becomes common in altitude from 500 to 1000 m.
Seychelles: A common weed, often abundant on open, moist soil of altitude and in shaded plots.
West Indies: Paspalum paniculatum is an indigenous species. It likes humid and slightly shaded environments. It colonises lawns and various mechanically weeded plant formations.

Local harmfulness

Comoros: Paspalum paniculatum is a weed found in old plantations of manioc or banana.
Madagascar: weed of crops on cleared burning "or tavy" after the first years of cultivation (progressive installation of grasses), it is harmful to upland rice on forest burning (or "tavy"), cassava and some badly maintained perennial crops (coffee, banana).
Mauritius: A weed of high harmfulness in sugar cane cultivation. It is not very common in other cultures.
Mayotte: Paspalum paniculatum is a frequent weed, present in 14% of cultivated plots. It is common in fruit and forage crops, as well as in pineapple plantations. It can also be found in ylang plantations. It is mainly found in the center of the island, but also in the north of the island.
Reunion: This plant can infest all cultures. It is present in nearly 40% of cultivated land on the island. It became a major weed of sugarcane throughout the humid area of the island regularly reaching a covering of 70-85%.
Seychelles: At high density, P. paniculatum is a problem in orchards, vegetable cultivation and tea plantations and banana.
West Indies: Paspalum paniculatum is a weed that is generally not very frequent in crops where it sometimes occupies the edges of fields. It disappears in chemically weeded plots where the soil is frequently ploughed. It is more common in mechanically weeded orchards and although it is not a harmful species, mowing can be occasionally difficult when the clumps become dense and numerous.

Other : Paspalum paniculatum can be used in phyto-purification in the treatment of wastewater.

Herbarium pictures ReCOLNAT: https://explore.recolnat.org/search/botanique/simplequery=Paspalum%2520paniculatum