Emilia sonchifolia (L.) DC. ex Wight

Code

EMISO

Growth form

Broadleaf

Biological cycle

annual

Habitat

terrestrial

China: Emilia sonchifolia flowers and fruits from July to October.
Mayotte: Emilia sonchifolia flowers and fruits all the year round.
New Caledonia: The life cycle of Emilia sonchifolia is very short and its growth very fast.
Nicaragua: Emilia sonchifolia flowers and fruits all the year round.
West Indies: Emilia sonchifolia flowers and fruits almost all year round, especially from December to January.

Identification key for Emilia species
 

Emilia sonchifolia is growing in areas with a weak and pronounced dry season, preferring moist, sunny or slightly shaded, not to dry localities; also found in drier places, along roads and ditches, earth banks, gardens, lawns and Imperata fields, shifting cultivation lands, tea rubber and other plantations; locally abundant but always scattered. From 0-3000 m. Upland rice fields.

Central Africa: Emilia sonchifolia grows in ruderal areas, cultivated areas, gardens, fallow land, roadsides, railways and sandbanks.
West Indies: Emilia sonchifolia is a ruderal and shrubby species found at altitudes of between 0 and 650 m.
Brazil: Emilia sonchifolia thrives in sunny environments. It does not tolerate much shade. It tolerates soils of low fertility, but grows best in rich, moist soils. It does not tolerate cold.
Comoros: Emilia sonchifolia is abundant in open areas and old vegetables crops.
French Guiana: Nitrophilic species favored in abundantly fertilized vegetable crops soils.
Madagascar: Ruderal species and weed of crops in the highlands and the eastern slope. It is quite common in cultivated areas and on roadsides, up to 1000 m altitude.
Mauritius: Ruderal herbaceous plant and weed of littoral herbaceous vegetation, sugar cane fields, roadsides and stream banks.
Mayotte: Emilia sonchifolia is commonly naturalized in a wide range of secondarized environments in hygrophilic and mesophilic regions. It develops in particular in the cultures and the urban zones.
New Caledonia: It grows in disturbed and sunny places up to 300 m above sea level.
Reunion: This species has no particular soil preference. It is a pantropical species, ruderal in sunny areas and a common weed of various cultures. It develops all around Reunion, preferably 0-700 meters, but can be met up to 1000 m. On the West Coast, drier, it is less common and appears in irrigated plots.
Seychelles: Species present at all altitudes and under a wide variety of conditions.
 

Global control

Chemical control: 2,4-D at 0.5 to 0.8 kgha-1 or MCPA at 0,4 kg ha-1 applied within 20-30 days after emergence gives good control of Emilia sonchifolia.

Local control

New Caledonia: The germination and spread of this annual species should be prevented as much as possible by maintaining a dense herbaceous cover of pastures. Manual removal of insulated plants is often enough to get rid of them.

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