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Overview
Diagnostic
Description
Global description
Mollugo nudicaulis is one of the few tropical species with a rosette growth habit. The whole plant is glabrous. The leaves are spatulate. From the center of the rosette emerges several stalks with inflorescences in cymes. The flowers are small and white. The fruit is a capsule containing numerous black seeds.
Cotyledons
The cotyledons are reduced. They are 4 mm long and 2 mm wide. They are briefly stalked and oblong in shape.
First Leaves
The first leaves are simple and alternate, arranged in rosette at the surface of the soil. The lamina is spatulate. The top is rounded and has a small mucro. They are 15 to 20 mm long and 10 mm wide.
Growth habit
The plant has a rosette growth habit, above the soil surface. Only the inflorescence is erect, very branched and can measure 10 to 20 cm high.
Underground System
The plant has a taproot system.
Stem
The stem is particularly reduced because of the arrangement of leaves in rosette. From the center of the rosette emerges several filiform axis, without leaves, which are the peduncles of the inflorescences.
Leaf
The leaves are simple and alternate. They are all arranged in a rosette at the base of the plant. They 3 to 6 cm long and 1 to 2 cm wide. The lamina is spatulate to oblanceolate. The base is attenuated into a slightly differentiated petiole. The apex is rounded, sometimes mucronate. The margin is entire. Four or five side ribs are visible on the upper side. Both sides are glabrous and glaucous green in color.
Inflorescence
The flowers are arranged in loose inflorescences cymes with 2 or 3 branches. These inflorescences are carried by long stalks of 5 to 10 cm. A single individual can develop 2 to 20 stalks.
Flower
The flowers are small, with a diameter of 5 mm, composed of 5 spreading, floral parts, greenish white in color.
Fruit
The fruits are dehiscent capsules having 3 to 5 valves containing 15 to 25 seeds. These capsules measure 2.5 mm high and remain trapped in the floral parts until the opening.
Seed
Seeds are lenticular, 0.5 mm in diameter. The surface is finely granular and black in colour.
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Natural History
Cyclicity
Northern Cameroon: M. nudicaulis is mainly an early and mid-crop cycle species. Its frequency in cultivated plots ranges from 43% in early cycle (June) to 20% at the end of the crop cycle (October). Germination begins in May following the first significant rains, regardless of tillage. This period of germination is often of short duration (one week). Each cultural operation (plowing, weeding, hilling) is followed by another period of germination. Flowering starts in the month of June and ends in August. Fruiting and seed dispersal take place from July to October. Flowering and fruiting may be delayed by 1 month in the case of late emergences. The entire duration of M. nudicaulis development cycle is 3 to 4 months.
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Ecology
Northern Cameroon: M. nudicaulis is a species occurring in loam to sandy soil. It develops on the alluvium, the planosols and ferruginous soils. It is rare on heavy clay soils like vertisols. This is a common species from the Sahelo-Sudanese regions where the annual rainfall is between 600 and 800 mm, to the Sudanese regions where rainfall is above 1300 mm.
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Demography and Conservation
Risk Statement
Local harmfulness
Northern Cameroon: It is present in 35% of cultivated land, especially in humid region in the old plots in intensive cultivations. This species is favored by the mechanization of tillage. It belongs to the floristic cortege of Commelina benghalensis.
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Information Listing
References
- Le Bourgeois Th., 1993. Les mauvaises herbes dans la rotation cotonnière au Nord-Cameroun (Afrique) - Amplitude d'habitat et degré d'infestation - Cycle de développement. Thèse USTL Montpellier II, Montpellier, France, 241p.
- Grard, P., T. Le Bourgeois and H. Merlier (2010). Adventrop V.1.5 Les adventices d'Afrique soudano-sahélienne. Montpellier, France, Cirad.
- Berhaut J., 1967. Flore du Sénégal. 2ème éd. Clairafrique éd., Dakar, Sénégal, 485p.
- Merlier H. & Montégut J., 1982. Adventices tropicales. ORSTOM-GERDAT-ENSH éd., Montpellier, France, 490p.
- Hutchinson J., Dalziel J. M., Keay R. W. J. & Hepper F. N., 1954. Flora of West Tropical Africa. Vol. I part. 1. 2ème éd. The Whitefriars Press ed., London & Tonbridge, 295p.
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