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Eichhornia crassipes

Common name:	Water Hyacinth	Family:	Pontederiaceae
Author:	(C.Mart.)Solms.	Botanical references:	50, 200
Synonyms:	Eichhornia speciosa (Kunth.)
Known Hazards:	Eating the plant, which is reported to contain HCN, alkaloid, and triterpenoid, may induce itching[269]. Fresh plants contain prickly crystals[269]. Plants sprayed with 2,4-D may accumulate lethal doses of nitrates[269].
Range:	Tropics. Naturalized in central and southern Portugal[50].
Habitat:	Water courses[144]. Moist and boggy areas at elevations of 200 - 1500 metres in Nepal[272].
Edibility Rating (1-5):	1	Medicinal Rating (1-5):	0

Other Possible Synonyms:	From various places across the web, may not be correct. See below.
	Piaropus crassipes[B,P] Pontederia crassipes[G]
Other Common Names:	From various places around the Web, may not be correct. See below.
	Common Water Hyacinth [P], Common Water-hyacinth [B],
Epithets:	From a Dictionary of Botanical Epithets
	crassipes = thick foot
Systematics:	From a USDA Plants Database
	Order: Liliales. Water-Hyacinth family
Noxious, Invasive and Injurious Weeds	From USDA PLANTS database, Weeds Australia , DEFRA Injurious Weeds
	Listed as noxious/invasive for: USA Invasive.

Physical Characteristics

Perennial. . The flowers are hermaphrodite (have both male and female organs). It can fix Nitrogen. We rate it 1/5 for edibility and 0/5 for medicinal use.

The plant prefers light (sandy), medium (loamy) and heavy (clay) soils. The plant prefers acid, neutral and basic (alkaline) soils. It can grow in semi-shade (light woodland) or no shade. It requires moist soil.

Edible Uses

Leaves.

Young leaves and petioles - cooked[144, 177, 272]. Virtually tasteless[144, 177]. Said to be used as a carotene-rich table vegetable in Formosa. Javanese sometimes cook and eat the green parts and inflorescence[269].
Flower spikes - cooked[144, 177].

Medicinal Uses

Disclaimer

None known

Other Uses

Biomass Pollution.

Water hyacinths are potentially an excellent source of biomass. Through an anaerobic fermentation process, polluted hyacinths can be converted to the natural gas methane - a costly process that may become more economical as supplies of underground natural gas are depleted[269]. Dried and cleansed plants can be used as fertilizer and plant mulch[144, 269]. Eventually, living aquatic plants might serve aboard long-distance manned spacecraft, absorbing wastes and converting carbon dioxide to oxygen, then being themselves converted into food[269]. The plant can be cultivated for use in wastewater treatment, and can be incorporated into a system where the biomass is harvested for fuel production[269]. Since this biomass is a by-product of wastewater treatment, it has a positive environmental impact, and thus poses no threat as competitor to food, feed, or fibre-producing plants[269]. Wilted water hyacinth, mixed with earth, cow dung, and woodashes in the Chinese compost fashion, can yield useful compost in just two months[269]. Although potential yields are incredible, so are the costs of removal or attempted eradication of this water weed. Standing crops have been estimated to produce 100-120 tonnes per hectare per year[269].. Under ideal conditions, each plant can produce 248 offspring in 90 days[269].
Water hyacinth roots naturally absorb pollutants, including such toxic chemicals as lead, mercury, and strontium 90 (as well as some organic compounds believed to be carcinogenic) in concentrations 10,000 times that in the surrounding water[269].
In Africa, fresh plants are used as cushions in canoes and to plug holes in charcoal sacks[269].

Cultivation details

240, 200
Prefers growing in a sunny but cool pool[260]. Water Hyacinth is reported to tolerate an annual precipitation of 82 to 270cm, an annual temperature range of 21.1 to 27.2° C and an estimated pH in the range of 5.0 to 7.5[269]. The leaves are killed by frost, and plants cannot tolerate water temperatures in excess of 34° C[269].
This species is not very cold-hardy, tolerating temperatures down to about 0° c[260]. It requires greenhouse protection over winter in Britain[1]. Plants can be grown outdoors in the warmer parts of the year and then be potted up in moist compost during long spells of cold weather[260].
A very invasive weed of water courses in the tropics[260], causing great environmental problems in many areas where it has become naturalized. Subsistence farmers in Bangladesh face disaster when rafts of water hyacinth weighing up to 300 tonnes per hectare float over their rice paddies. As the floods recede, the weeds remain on the germinating rice, thus killing it[269]. Engineers have estimated that the Panama Canal would be impassable within three years without continuous aquatic weed control measures[269].
Azotobacter chroococcum, a Nitrogen-fixing bacteria, may be concentrated around the bases of the petioles but doesn't fix Nitrogen unless the plant is suffering extreme Nitrogen-deficiency[269].

Propagation

Seed -
Seeds can tolerate submersion or desiccation for 15 years and still germinate[269]. Scarification, but not light, may be required for germination[269].

Suppliers

For more details of plant suppliers please see our Suppliers Page which lists many more places to look.

Web References

[H] Details of Scandanavian and European Common names in Henriette's names database
[E] Ethnobotany Data (common names, uses, countries) from the Ethnobotany Database.
[V] Images from the Vascular Plant Image Gallery of the Texas A& M Bioinformatics Working Group.
[B] Data (Latin & Common names, other references) from the BONAP's Synonymized Checklist of the Vascular Flora of the United States, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.
[C] Taxon data. from the CalFlora database.
[G] Data (Common Names, Uses, Distribution) from the USDA/ARS NPGS's GRIN taxonomic database.
[P] Data. (uses, distribution, wetland) from the USDA'a Plants database.

References for the family Pontederiaceae.

[CHINA] Data Very detailed botanical/identification info. from the Flora of China.

See the PFAF Links Pages for other sources.

Also try Photos and info from the The Plants Database which has 14,000 images.

References

[1] F. Chittendon. RHS Dictionary of Plants plus Supplement. 1956 Oxford University Press 1951
Comprehensive listing of species and how to grow them. Somewhat outdated, it has been replaces in 1992 by a new dictionary (see [200]).

[50] ? Flora Europaea Cambridge University Press 1964
An immense work in 6 volumes (including the index). The standard reference flora for europe, it is very terse though and with very little extra information. Not for the casual reader.

[144] Cribb. A. B. and J. W. Wild Food in Australia. Fontana 1976 ISBN 0-00-634436-4
A very good pocket guide.

[177] Kunkel. G. Plants for Human Consumption. Koeltz Scientific Books 1984 ISBN 3874292169
An excellent book for the dedicated. A comprehensive listing of latin names with a brief list of edible parts.

[200] Huxley. A. The New RHS Dictionary of Gardening. 1992. MacMillan Press 1992 ISBN 0-333-47494-5
Excellent and very comprehensive, though it contains a number of silly mistakes. Readable yet also very detailed.

[260] Phillips. R. & Rix. M. Conservatory and Indoor Plants Volumes 1 & 2 Pan Books, London. 1998 ISBN 0-330-37376-5
Excellent photos of over 1,100 species and cultivars with habits and cultivation details plus a few plant uses. Many species are too tender for outdoors in Britain though there are many that can be grown outside.

[269] Duke. J. Handbook of Energy Crops - 1983
Published only on the Internet, excellent information on a wide range of plants.

Readers Comments

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Plant information taken from the Plants For A Future - Species Database. Copyright (c) 1997-2003.
WEB search engine by Rich Morris - Home Page- Contact Info
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