Diversity and Growth Characteristics of Eupatorium odoratum and

Local Plants in Invasive Communities

Jiangfei Qian

, Jingtian Xu

, Simengyu Li

, NengQin Li

and Ruifang Wang

Pu’er University, Pu’er, Yunnan Province 665000, China

Keywords: Invasion, Eupatorium odoratum, Diversity.

Abstract: The invasion Eupatorium odoratum has become a key research in ecological protection and deployment. Puer

located in the south of Yunnan in China, is bordered by Burma, Vietnam and Laos, and located at the frontier

of the invasion E. odoratum. In Puer, E. odoratum can be found in abandoned land, wasteland edge, freeway,

tea garden and many other places, threaten the biodiversity of border cities. In this study, the biomass, the

specific leaf area, the diversity index and the species richness of E. odoratum and the local plants were

measured. It is found that the invasive community mostly a single dominant community with only one species,

E. odoratum. The local plants are difficult to survive. The main reason is that its higher biomass, larger leaf

area than native species of E. odoratum, which leads to the difficulty of the growth of native plants. In this

study, the growth difference between E. odoratum and native plants provided a theoretical basis for the control

of E. odoratum and other invasive plants.

1 INTRODUCTION

Eupatorium odoratum, is a perennial, tufted herb or

subshrub of the genus Eupatorium in the Compositae

family. The whole plant of E. odoratum has a certain

toxicity, very strong reproductive ability, rapid

growth, and a wide range of ecological adaptability,

small seeds. E. odoratum spreads easily through a

variety of ways and scramble for water, fertilizer and

other ecological resources with native plants. In

addition, allelochemicals can be produced to inhibit

the growth of native new plants, resulting in the

weakening or even loss of biodiversity in a large area

of the invasive area (Liu 2007, Hu 2007). E. odoratum

in China have caused serious harm to agriculture,

forestry, animal husbandry, as well as human and

animal health (Jia 2020, Xue 2010). E. odoratum has

the common characteristics of invasive alien plants.

It competes and occupies the ecological niche of

native species, affects the survival of native species,

reduces species diversity, and makes great use of

local water and soil nutrients, which is very

detrimental to soil and water conservation. It destroys

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7173-2132

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0013-2973

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4623-9178

the nature and integrity of the landscape and affects

the genetic diversity. After successful invasion, E.

odoratum will grow wildly, which is difficult to

control, resulting in serious biological pollution and

serious damage to the ecosystem, and this damage is

lasting andirreversible.

Although there are many researches on the

biological characteristics and control measures of E.

odoratum in China and abroad, the harm of E.

odoratum has not been fundamentally solved (Zhang

2009). In addition to studying the biological

characteristics of E. odoratum, the differences in

growth characteristics between E. odoratum and

native plants in invasive communities are also worth

studying. Through the investigation and analysis of

the plant community structure and the characteristics

of plant species in the invasive sites of E. odoratum,

the differences of growth characteristics between E.

odoratum and other species were obtained, which

provided a certain theoretical basis for better analysis

of the mechanical research and control of E.

odoratum invasion.

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9399-2648

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4715-6240

Qian, J., Xu, J., Li, S., Li, N. and Wang, R.

Diversity and Growth Characteristics of Eupatorium odoratum and Local Plants in Invasive Communities.

DOI: 10.5220/0011186000003444

In Proceedings of the 2nd Conference on Artiﬁcial Intelligence and Healthcare (CAIH 2021), pages 86-90

ISBN: 978-989-758-594-4

2 MATERIALS AND METHODS

2.1 Sample Plot Survey

Puer is located in the southwest border of Yunnan

Guizhou Plateau and the south of Yunnan Province.

The climatic conditions of Puer are favorable for the

growth and reproduction of E. odoratum. This

experiment, the choice pot is near downtown in puer

tea college tea tree in the back empty abandoned

farmland, wasteland, Buddha lotus hill road, plum

lake forest edges, wash the landmark wetland

wasteland, tourism circle near the desert, Ninger

Jinbao Mountain, the sequence numbers for sample

areⅠ-Ⅷ.

2.2 Sample Plot Setup and Sampling

Method

The invasive areas with high distribution of E.

odoratum were divided into three types: mild (E.

odoratum coverage <5%), moderate (E. odoratum

coverage 30%-40%) and severe (E. odoratum

coverage over 90%).

Leaf area was calculated by paper pattern

weighing.

Plant biomass is the amount of matter

accumulated by plants per unit area (dry weight:

g/m2).

Relative biomass = species/organ biomass/total

biomass.

2.3 Simpson Diversity Index (D)

The Simpson diversity index is the probability that

two randomly sampled individuals belong to different

species, and its value is equal to 1 minus the

probability that two randomly sampled individuals

belong to the same species.

𝐷=1−

∑

𝑃









，P









(1)

Where D is Simpson index, ni is the number of

individuals of the ith species, the lowest value of

Simpson index is 0, and the highest value is (1-1/S).

2.4 Shannon Wiener Diversity Index

(Zhang 2006, Liu 1994)

H=−

∑







log(Pi) (2)

Where, Pi= Ni /N, represents the relative abundance

of the ith species, N is the sum of the number of all

species in the community, ni is the number of

individuals of the ith species, and is the species trees

in the community.

2.5 Pielou Evenness Index (Zhang

2006, Liu 1994, Liu 2006)

max/ HHJsw =

(3)

Pielou evenness index (Pielou evenness Index)

reflects the evenness of species composition to a

certain extent. It is the distribution of individual

numbers of all species in a community or habitat.

2.6 Margale Species Richness Index

(Liu 2006, Huang 2006)

LnNsD

/)1( −=

(4)

The Margale species richness index represents the

number of species in a quadrat of a given size,

ignoring the number of interspecific individuals

2.7 Community Similarity Coefficient

(Liu 2006)

)/(2 bajC +=

(5)

Where, C represents the community similarity

coefficient, J represents the number of species in both

communities, and A and B respectively represent the

total number of species in the two communities.

2.8 Life Forms of Plants

According to the Danish ecologist Raunkaer C's life

type classification standards. Species of a life form in

the community/total species of plants in the

community ´100%= percentage of a life form of a

plant.

2.9 Biomass Allocation

Leaf weight fraction (LMF, leaf weight /aboveground

plant weight); Specific leaf area (SLA, total leaf area

/ total leaf weight); Mean average leaf area (MLA,

total leaf area / leaf number).

2.10 The Data Analysis

SPSS (23.0) software was used to analyze the

differences among species diversity in invasive

communities of E. odoratum and native local plants.

Regression analysis and correlation analysis were

performed for community biomass, evenness index

Diversity and Growth Characteristics of Eupatorium odoratum and Local Plants in Invasive Communities

and species richness index. Before the data analysis,

the normal distribution test is carried out for all kinds

of data.

3 RESULTS AND ANALYSIS

3.1 Species Composition of the Invasive

Community

Human disturbance and light condition are two

important factors to determine the composition of E.

odoratum community. In the investigated plots, there

were 5 species of plants, including E. odoratum,

Biden spilosa L., Eupatorium adenophora Spreng.,

Pantropical weeds and Camellia sinensis (L.) O.

Ktze, belonging to 3 families and 3 genera. E.

odoratum was the main species, and was the only

species in the 4th and 6th plots. Jia Guikang et al.

found that after the successful invasion of E.

odoratum (Jia 2010). It is easy to "overgrow" into

dense forests, occupy the appropriate ecological

niche, develop into a single optimal community, and

compete for the limited living environment and soil

nutrients of the surrounding local plants. The greater

the coverage of E. odoratum, the lower the species

richness. Some low-lying light- loving plants in the

community did not grow well or even failed to grow

due to the low utilization rate of light.

3.2 Diversity of Community Species

The species richness of the invasive community of E.

odoratum was low, as the invasive community of E.

odoratum caused serious damage to the species

diversity of the community. The number of species in

the quadrats was not more than 5, and the number of

other species in the quadrats was not more than 4,

except for E. odoratum. The number of species within

each sample site was low, with the most being sample

site 5 with four species, the species richness index did

not consider the evenness of the distribution of

species in the community, so the largest richness

index was plot 2 (0.87), richness index of plot 4 and

plot 6 was 0, and there was only one species, E.

odoratum, in both plots. At the same time, the

evenness index of both plots was the maximum

infinity.

Table 1: Plant species diversity and evenness indices.

SP S R S

SW E

Ⅰ 2 0.36 0.30 0.21 0.30

Ⅱ 3 0.87 0.56 0.41 0.38

Ⅲ 2 0.43 0.42 0.27 0.38

Ⅳ 1 0.00 0.99 0.10 ∞

Ⅴ 4 0.17 0.70 0.50 0.40

Ⅵ 1 0.00 0.98 0.12 ∞

Ⅶ 3 0.59 0.47 0.36 0.32

(SP: Sampling plot, S: Species number, R: Richness index, S

Simpson index Simpson, SW: Shannon-Wiener index

Shannon-Wiener, E: Evenness index）

In terms of the life pattern of E. odoratum

invasive communities, the proportion of highbudding

plants was the largest. Except for plot 7, the

proportion of highbudding plants in other plots was

as high as 100%, and the proportion of highbudding

plants in plot 7 was as high as 87%. In the rest, only

the proportion of groundbudding plants was 13%.

The composition of community life patterns reflected

the characteristics of warm and wet growing season

in the area where E. odoratum invasion communities

were located. In addition, it also reflected the degree

of disturbance in the community to a certain extent.

The larger the proportion of highbud plants, the lower

the degree of disturbance.

3.3 Similarity Coefficient

The community similarity coefficient as a measure of

similarity between different habitats (table 2), the

results showed that E. odoratum invasion community

similarity is higher, the sample area 6 to 4 with the

sample up to 1, the two pieces in the sample area are

only E. odoratum a species, the lowest also reached

0.33, E. odoratum founded after the invasion of

community, the species composition and more

focused, less The species composition of

communities in different plots was similar to each

other.

Table 2: Similarity coefficients.

SP12 3 4 5 6 7

Ⅰ 0.40 0.50 0.67 0.33 0.67 0.40

Ⅱ 0.80 0.50 0.86 0.50 0.33

Ⅲ 0.67 0.67 0.67 0.40

Ⅳ 0.40 1.00 0.50

Ⅴ 0.40 0.29

Ⅵ 0.50

3.4 Biomass Allocation

Previous studies have shown that the higher the total

CAIH 2021 - Conference on Artiﬁcial Intelligence and Healthcare

leaf area of exotic species is, the more carbon it can

capture through assimilation under the same light and

radiation conditions, and the more favorable it will be

for plant morphogenesis and biomass accumulation.

According to table 3, in terms of total leaf area,

average single leaf area and average specific leaf area

of various plots, plot 5 had the largest total leaf area,

but smaller mean single leaf area and specific leaf

area compared to other plots.

Figure 1: Total leaf area (TLA) of seven sampling plots.

Figure 2: Specific leaf area (SLA) of seven sampling plots.

Figure 3: Mean single leaf area (MLA) of seven sampling

plots.

Figure 4: Leaf weight fraction (LWF) of seven sampling

plots.

Generally, within the same community or

individual, the greater the SLA the greater the

photosynthetically capacity. One-way ANOVA data

(Figure 2) showed that the greatest difference in SLA

was between sample plot 5 and sample plot 6, mainly

because sample plot 5 was a wetland edge heathland

with significantly better soil fertility and moisture

content than sample plot 6 forest edge heathland,

which provided a better growing environment for E.

odoratum. Leaf area is closely related to plant

photosynthesis. The greatest difference in TLA was

between sample plot 1 and sample plot 5, with little

difference in MLA, the smallest being sample plot 7

and the largest being sample plot 2. The LMF values

between 0.12 to 0.24 for seven sample plots.

4 DISCUSSION AND

CONCLUSION

The invasion of exotic plants can affect the local

ecosystem. They compete with native plants for

limited living space, water and fertiliser, light and air,

threatening the survival and distribution of local

plants, and changing the species composition and

climatic conditions of the original local plants, thus

causing a sudden reduction in local biodiversity. This

impact and damage are lasting and prolonged.

Currently, E. odoratum has occupied most of the area

near the urban areas of Puer, mainly in fields, ground,

abandoned wasteland and other land types, where the

renewal and growth of forest trees are affected.

In this study, the communities invaded by E.

odoratum were mainly composed of compositae,

among which there was only one species of E.

odoratum in two sample plots, forming a patch of E.

odoratum community, with a large number of

individual E. odoratum, large projection area, large

2000

4000

6000

8000

ⅠⅡⅢⅣⅤⅥⅦ

TLA(cm

）

100

150

200

250

ⅠⅡⅢⅣⅤⅥⅦ

SLA(g/cm

）

ⅠⅡⅢⅣⅤⅥⅦ

MLA(cm

)

0,05

0,1

0,15

0,2

0,25

0,3

0,35

ⅠⅡⅢⅣⅤⅥⅦ

LWF（%）

Diversity and Growth Characteristics of Eupatorium odoratum and Local Plants in Invasive Communities

biomass and strong survival ability. When E.

odoratum plants were taller than or equal to 15cm,

they could inhibit the growth of other herbs in the

community through shading, which seriously

damaged the local biodiversity. In addition, the

allelopathic effects of E. odoratum make it

impossible for local plants to survive in the invaded

areas.

There have been many reports on the

morphological characteristics, biomass allocation

and photosynthetic characteristics of E. odoratum in

response to light, water, phosphorus and nitrogen

nutrition. However, there are few reports on the

community invasiability. Therefore, the effects of

comprehensive environmental factors on community

invasibility should be considered in the further

studies.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work was supported by the National Natural

Science Foundation of China (31660170) and

Outstanding Young Teacher program

(2020GGJS006).

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