Naturalization of alien plants in China

Abstract

Naturalization (the establishment of a self-sustaining population for at least a decade) is a fundamental precondition for plant invasion and so compiling a complete inventory of naturalized alien species is necessary for predicting and hence preventing such invasion. However, nationwide information on naturalized plants in China is still lacking. We compiled a nationwide list of the naturalized plant species of China, based on various literature reports. The list comprised a total of 861 naturalized plant species belonging to 110 families and 465 genera. The three most dominant families were Compositae, Poaceae, and Leguminosae, accounting for 16, 13 and 12% of naturalized plants, respectively. Among genera, Euphorbia and Solanum had the most naturalized species, followed by Ipomoea, Amaranthus, Oenothera, and Trifolium. Over half of all aliens were of American origin (52%), followed by those with European (14%) and Asian (13%) origins. Annuals and perennial herbs were prevalent among naturalized species; comparison to other studies suggests however that the invasive potential is higher among plants with longer life cycles than those of annuals. The taxonomic pattern of plant naturalization in China is similar to patterns worldwide. However, the low proportion of naturalized plants within the Chinese flora overall suggests that the potential for plant invasions in China may be high. Therefore, greater attention should be focused on naturalization of alien plants in China, especially concerning species of dominant families or genera, and those with a perennial life cycle.

Low plant diversity and floristic homogenization in fast-urbanizing towns in Shandong Peninsular, China: Effects of urban greening at regional scale for ecological engineering

“…The pooled species list across all sampled plots in each county town was compiled as the plant species catalog of the urban green spaces. All species were firstly classified as native or exotic by their immigration status (Pysěk et al, 2004), which was consistent with the Flora of China (Wu et al, 1994(Wu et al, -2013, Flora of Shandong Province (Chen et al, 1992(Chen et al, -1994 and specialized database (Jiang et al, 2011). For native and exotic species, they were further divided respectively into cultivated or wild according to whether they were deliberately planted or not.…”

Plant invasions in China: an emerging hot topic in invasion science

“…Few papers (11%) offered integrative analyses some of which provided several lists of invasive plants in China at the national scale (Liu et al 2005, He 2011. In addition, some recent papers listed naturalized plants (Wu et al 2010, Jiang et al 2011) and invasive plants , Huang et al 2009, Xu et al 2012). Yet, a comprehensive list of plant species non-native to China is missing thus far.…”

“…Data on the introduction history of non-native plants are limited, but analyzing the history of 123 plant species showed a continuous influx of non-native species to China after 1800 (Huang et al 2011). However, much more species are known as naturalized in China (861 species according to Jiang et al 2011), and casuals are usually underrepresented in species lists. It remains thus an open question whether the influx of non-native species since 1800 took place linearly or rather exponentially as indicated by the exponential growth of the number of invasive alien species of plants and animals since 1850 (Xu et al 2012).…”

“…Although some lists of naturalized plants in China have recently been compiled (Wu et al 2010, Jiang et al 2011) and some on invasive species already exist (Liu et al 2005, Huang et al 2009, Xu et al 2012), a comprehensive list of all non-native plants in China is still lacking. China is a large country in area with starkly varying environmental conditions.…”

East Asian Species in Alien Flora of European Russia

“…Global species exchange supposed human me diated immigration of species from various continents by different pathways (Mack 2003, Carlton & Ruiz 2005, Hul me et al 2008) resulting the biotic homogenization across the globe as one of the consequences (Olden & Poff 2003, Qian & Ricklefs 2006, Stohlgren et al 2011. All parts of the world except Antarctic proved to be providers of aliens, but America, Asia and Europe have served as important do nor areas of alien species to various regions (Prinzing et al 2002, Fridley 2008, Lambdon et al 2008, Morozova et al 2008, Phillips et al 2010, Jiang et al 2011.…”