Hemerochory

Hemerochorous spread of plants through human cultural activity very likely already happened in the Stone Age, but demonstrably at the latest in antiquity, namely along old trade routes.

Many useful plants, such as tomato, potato, pumpkin and French bean did not reach Central Europe until the 16th century, after the American continent was discovered, and are now grown worldwide.

The ships arrive at the ports with empty cargo hold, but fully pumped ballast tanks.

In the draining of this ballast water, these ports receive thousands of cubic meters of seawater brimming with alien creatures now in a new environment.

Australia was the first country to introduce a ballast water policy back in 1990 and is now the most determined to address this problem.

Wheat, barley, lentil, beans, flax and poppy seeds, for example, are not typical plants for Central Europe, although they are all archaeotypes.

People brought them after the beginning of the Neolithic (about 6,500 years ago) gradually from the eastern Mediterranean to central Europe and the rest of the world through the upcoming centuries.

In central Europe, it is especially Cyperus esculentus which has been classified since the 1980s among the invasive species, because their tubers have been spread en masse, by sticking to vehicles or machines.

These include, for example, the gladioli, the ornamental onion, European bluebell, the snowdrop native to southeast Europe and the common clematis.

Plants that are considered to be archaeophytes, such as the poppy, native to the Mediterranean area, the real chamomile, the cornflower and field buttercup, spread through the seeds with the grain in Central Europe.

In spite of this, Cuscuta campestris, which is classified as a problematic weed in Australia, was accidentally imported into the country together with basil seeds in 1981, 1988 and 1990.