Morphological and ecological studies on“Seri”, Oenanthe javanica D. C. I.

Morphological differences between cultivated and wild seri in vegetative growth period

Abstract

Seri, Oenanthe javanica D. C., is a herbaceous perennial plant which belongs to Umbelliferae. It is a native of Asia, north of Japan proper and extends southward to Korea, China, Formosa, India, Indonesia and archipelagoes or the Queensland of Oceania.
Wild seri grows on marsh land in streams and basins and has been utilized in Japan for vegetable during the winter since the Mannyo Era (645-759 A. D.). Seri is commonly cultivated in Japan, Korea and China, and occasionally in Indo-China, Sumatra and the Malay peninsula for use as a potherb. FUJIWARA described in his“Engishiki”published in 928 A. D. that seri cultivation in Japan had already begun as early as in the 10th century. Nowadays, its commercial cultivation is found in urban areas throughout the Honshu, Japan′s main land, and its acreage totaled about 60 hectares in 1962.
In this experiment, 26 cultivated and 80 wild strains were collected from about 90 different locations in Japan and were cultivated in paddy bed under the same environmental condition in Sakai, Osaka prefecture (N 34°34′). The morphological differences between the cultivated and wild strains were studied from October, 1961 to January, 1962. The geographical differentiations within each of the cultivated and wild strains were also investigated. The results obtained are summarized as follow:
1. Plant habit of seri could be classified into three types of erect, medium and prostrate. Most of the cultivated strains showed the erect type and none of the prostrate type was found among them, whereas only a few of wild strains showed the erect type for this character (Table 2).
2. With respect to plant height and length of leaf petiole, the cultivated strains generally showed higher values than the wild strains (Table 3 and 4). They were more vigorous than the wild ones and tended to grow rapidly. Leaflets of the cultivated strains also tended to be larger in size and more round shape than those of the wild strains (Table 5).
3. Three main color of leaves and leaf petioles, reddish brown, light brown and green, could be distinguished. In both the cultivated and wild strains, the majority of plants had brown leaves or leaf petioles, which in some plants had pigmentation either on leaves or on petioles, in others had it on both parts, and a few of both cultivated and wild strains had green leaves and petioles. The former showed higher percentage of plants with green leaves and petioles than the latter (Table 2).
4. No apparent relationship between any of the abovementioned characters and geographical conditions of the native habitat was observed in both cultivated and wild strains.
5. The cultivated strains generally had more useful characteristics as a vegetable crop than the wild ones. Especially the cultivated strains from Sendai, Tokyo, Kyoto and Matsue cities were more vigorous than other cultivated strains and maintained green leaves during the winter and their leaflets were broad and desired rounded shape. They were attractive and worth growing. It may be assumed that growers in these areas have been raising their own strains by careful selection roguing from thier own fields.