Acacia longifolia

A. longifolia is a shrub or small tree native to Australia that has been deliberately introduced in various countries, mainly for dune stabilization and soil improvement (Dennill and Donnelly, 1991;Marchante et al., 2008;Stellatelli et al., 2014). It is recognized as an aggressive invasive weed in parts of its native range in Australia, and in some of the countries where it has been introduced;such as in South Africa, Spain and Portugal. Although is reported by PIER (2015) as invasive in California, USA, and was stated by Whibley and Symon (1992) as having established naturalized populations, it is reported as uncommon by Baldwin et al. (2012) and it is not listed in the California Invasive Plant Inventory (California Invasive Plant Council, 2016). It has a prolific seed production, and fast growth, facilitating its spread in suitable habitats (Rodríguez-Echevarria, 2010;Marchante et al., 2011). A. longifolia is associated with invasion events in New Zealand (Haysom and Murphy, 2003), and is recorded as invasive in Brazil (Instituto Horus, 2011).
A. longifolia affects the biodiversity and ecosystems by altering the microbial communities and by its high resource utilization, outcompeting native species (Marchante et al., 2008;Werner et al., 2010). It is included in the IUCN Global Invasive Species Database (GISD, 2015) and is reported as being costly to eradicate (EFSA Panel on Plant Health, 2015).