ABSTRACT
This chapter provides information on uses, folk medicine, chemistry, germplasm, distribution, ecology, cultivation, harvesting, yields, energy, and biotic factors of Cyperus Rotundus (Cyperaceae) Purple nutsedge. Considered the number one weed in many parts of the world, Purple sedge has still been suggested as a landscape plant in China, and as a soil binder in India. Tuberous rhizome, eaten in many areas as vegetable or chewed on, may be regarded as a famine food. Plants used as fodder for cattle in West Africa and India. According to Hartwell, purple nutsedge is used in folk remedies for phymata, abdominal tumors, glandular tumors, hard tumors, indurations of the stomach, liver, spleen, and uterus, and cervical cancer. Reported from the Euro-Siberian and North American Centers of Diversity, purple nutsedge, or cvs thereof, is reported to tolerate alkali, heat, high pH, insects, laterite, low pH, salt, and weeds.
