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Eco-physiology and habitat invasibility of an invasive, tropical shrub (Lantana camara) in western Himalayan forests of India

Mountains are remarkably diverse and globally important as cores of biological diversity. Mountains’ greatest values may be as sources of all the world's major rivers, and those of the Himalayas are no less important in terms of provisioning the ecosystem services that have thus far sustained huge populations of people and high levels of biodiversity. The survival of these ecosystems and wildlife are now threatened by human activities such as timber harvesting, intensive grazing by livestock, tourism, industrialization, and agricultural expansion into forestlands, and, above all, climate change which has led to the invasion of many noxious weeds. The present study aimed to analyze the invasion status of one such noxious weed, lantana (Lantana camara), from the western Himalayan foothills. A total of 122 plant species were recorded as associates from all lantana infested sites comprising 73 shrubs, 39 herbs, five sedges, and three grasses belonging to 47 families. Fabaceae and Asteraceae were found to be the most dominant families growing generously with lantana. Significant site effect was frequently observed than effect due to invasion status. Soil samples were collected and analyzed from highly invaded and moderately invaded areas to see the relationship between soil physicochemical properties and lantana growth. Results of the present study show that factors such as pH, total nitrogen, soil organic carbon, phosphorus, and potassium contents are positively impelling lantana invasion in all the sites. In some places soil nutrients were found improved effectively due to lantana invasion when compared from the soil of non-invaded areas thereby, increasing the likelihood of further invasion.