PHYTODIVERSITY AND ECOLOGICAL FEATURES OF WEED SPECIES OF SUFAID SUNG, PESHAWAR

Abstract

Field surveys were carried out to assess the phytodiversity, phenology, leaf size, leaf shape, life form and ethnobotany of weed flora of village Sufaid Sung, Peshawar from March 2017 to June 2019. Overall, 95 species have been reported associated with 31 families. Dominant families were Poaceae (22 species), Asteraceae (10 species) followed by Amaranthaceae and Papilionaceae (6 species each), Brassicaceae and Polygonaceae (5 species each), Euphorbiaceae and Solanaceae (4 species), Apiaceae, Caryophyllaceae, Cyperaceae, Malvaceae and Verbenaceae added 2 species, Chenopodiaceae and Convolvulaceae contributed 3 species, Apiaceae, Caryophyllaceae, Cyperaceae, Malvaceae and Verbenaceae added 2 species while the rest of 16 families contributed a single species each. The dominant life form was therophytes (76 species) followed by hemicryptophytes (11 species) and geophytes (8 species). Leaf size of the flora showed that the most dominant leaf size class was mesophyll (38 species) followed by macrophyll and microphyll (18 species each), nanopohyll (15 species) and leptophyll (5 species) while a single aphyllous. Simple leaf species were 68 while 26 species had dissected leaves. This study shows a detailed phytodiversical situation of weeds that may be important as reference work for future ethnobotanical, ecological, weed management and conservational studies.