Compilation
Salvinia auriculata

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Name

Identification
Salvinia auriculata Aubl. [family SALVINIACEAE ] (stored under name); Verified by Elías Ramón de la Sota, Salvinia minima Baker [family SALVINIACEAE ]
Related name
  • Salvinia rotundifolia
  • Salvinia auriculata
  • Salvinia olfersiana
  • Salvinia minima
  • Salvinia radula
  • Salvinia hispida
  • Salvinia salviniaceae
  • Salvinia nuriana
  • Salvinia adnata
  • Salvinia sprucei
  • Marsilaea unrecorded
  • Salvinia herzogii

Flora

Entry for SALVINIA molesta D.S. Mitch. [family SALVINIACEAE]
Herbarium
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (K)
Collection
Flora of Tropical East Africa
Resource Type
Reference Sources
Entry From
Flora of Tropical East Africa, page 1, (2000) Author: B. VERDCOURT, B.Sc., Ph.D.
Names
SALVINIA molesta D.S. Mitch. [family SALVINIACEAE], in Brit. Fern Gaz. 10: 251–252 (1972); Kornaś, Distr. Ecol. Pterid. Zambia: 122, map 82a (1979); Schelpe & Diniz, Fl. Moçamb., Pterid.: 66 (1979); W. Jacobsen, Ferns S. Afr.: 490, fig. 28, 369/a-b, map 185 (1983); Tarras-Wahlberg in Journ. E. Afr. Nat. Hist. Soc. 76 (189): 1–8 (1986); Schelpe & N.C. Anthony, F.S.A., Pterid.: 67, fig. 17/2, map 52 (1986); P.A. Thomas & Room in Nature 320: 581–584 (1986); P.A. Thomas in Environm. Conserv. 13: 242–248 (1986); Room in Trends Ecol. Evol. 5: 74–79 (1990); Brownsey & Smith-Dodsworth, New Zealand Ferns & Allied Pl.: 155, pl. 36b, fig. 198 (1989); J.E. Burrows, S. Afr. Ferns: 80, t. 13/1, fig. 78, map (1990); Faden in U.K.W.F. ed. 2: 38 (1994). Type: Zimbabwe, Lake Kariba, Ruziruhuru R. inlet, Mitchell 1330 (SRGH, holo., EA, K!, iso.)
SALVINIA auriculata [family SALVINIACEAE], [sensu auctt. e.g. Wild in Kirkia 2: 11, t. 1 (1961); 27: 181 (1961) & Schelpe, F.Z., Pterid.: 67, t. 19/b (1970); Faden in U.K.W.F.: 73 (1974), non Aubl.]
Information
Rich olive-green plant forming extensive floating mats; reproduces only by fragmentation. Stem up to 1.2 mm diameter with brown multicellular hairs up to 2 mm long on the under-surface. Floating leaves oblong to obovate or orbicular, 2.5 cm long, 2.4–3 cm wide, emarginate at the apex, rounded or cordate at the base, flat or usually infolded along the midrib, densely papillate on upper surface with multicellular papilla-hairs 1.5(–2) mm long bearing an apical structure made up of (2–)4 hairs joined at their apices; under-surface with sparser pale multicellular hairs up to 1 mm long; submerged leaves up to 12 cm long, with dense brown multicellular hairs up to 2 mm long. Sporocarps up to 55, ovoid, ± 1 mm diameter or slightly less, apiculate; macrosporocarps 2(–3), pedunculate; micro-sporocarps up to 53, sessile or subsessile; all covered with trichomes, but macrosporocarps more densely so; mature sporangia mostly empty, any spores present nearly always deformed; hollow massulae sometimes present in microsporangia. Fig. 1B.
Range
DISTR. K 3, 4 now a noxious weed banned from cultivation in many countries
Altitude range
1650–1900 m
Distribution
KENYA Trans-Nzoia District Kitale, Barnley H170/57!;KENYA Naivasha District Lake Naivasha, near R. Mennel’s farm, 12 Feb. 1982, Mwangangi 2169!;KENYA Nairobi (cultivated), Feb. 1957, Bally 11390!
Distribution (external)
; Congo (Brazzaville)
Congo (Kinshasa)
Zambia
Mozambique
Zimbabwe
Botswana
Namibia
Caprivi Strip
South Africa;
Sri Lanka
Indonesia
Australia (Queensland Western Australia)
New Zealand
Brazil;
Notes
Probably a hybrid and now an aggressive weed. Differs from S. auriculata Aubl. and its allies in having long straight secund chains of sessile or subsessile male sporocarps 1 mm or less in diameter containing mostly empty sporangia. The use of a weevil to combat S. molesta is one of the success stories of biological control – see R.C. Moran in Fiddlehead Forum 19: 26–28 (1992). Areas of up to a 1000 km2 have been cleared of the weed in this way.

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