Ripe fruits can be eaten out-of-hand and can be made into pie or sauce or preserved whole in syrup. They are often made into jam, jelly, relish or pickles. Brazilians ferment the juice into vinegar or wine, and sometimes prepare distilled liquor. Seeds are extremely resinous and should not be eaten. The strong, spicy emanation from bushes being pruned irritates the respiratory passages of sensitive persons. The leaves have been spread over the floors of Brazilian homes. When walked upon, they release their pungent oil, which repels flies. The bark contains 20 to 28.5% tannin and can be used for treating leather.
Medicinal Uses: In Brazil the leaf infusion is taken as a stomachic, febrifuge and astringent. In Surinam, the leaf decoction is drunk as a cold remedy and, in combination with lemongrass, as a febrifuge (Morton, 1987).
Young plants are damaged by temperatures below -2.22º C, but well-established plants have suffered only superficial injury at -5.56º C. The plant revels in full sun. It requires only moderate rainfall and, being deep-rooted, can stand a long dry season. E. uniflora grows in almost any type of soil-sand, sandy loam, stiff clay, soft limestone-and can even stand water logging for a time, but it is intolerant of salt (Morton, 1987).
Principal source: Salgueiro et al. 2004. Even population differentiation for maternal and biparental gene markers in Eugenia uniflora , a widely distributed species from the Brazilian coastal Atlantic rain forest
Morton, 1987 E. uniflora
Compiler: National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) & IUCN/SSC Invasive Species Specialist Group (ISSG)
Review:
Publication date: 2006-04-21
Recommended citation: Global Invasive Species Database (2024) Species profile: Eugenia uniflora. Downloaded from http://www.iucngisd.org/gisd/species.php?sc=983 on 08-12-2024.
Chemical: Kline and Duquesnel (1996) report that using the Cut Surface method of chemical application with Garlon 3A at 50% concentration or a 10% concentration of Garlon 4 achieved a rating of \"Good\" control. Basal bark application of Garlon 4 at 10% concentration only received a rating of \"Moderate\" control.
Biological: Research into the biological control of E. uniflora has not been conducted, but certain invertebrates and diseases are known to attack this species. E. uniflora are highly attractive to Caribbean and Mediterranean fruit flies, but the incidence of infestation was found to vary greatly from location to location, with some plants being unmolested. Scale insects and caterpillars occasionally attack the foliage. Diseases encountered in its invasive range in Florida are leaf spot caused by Cercospora eugeniae, Helminthosporium sp., and Phyllostica eugeniae; thread blight from infection by Corticium stevensii; anthracnose from Colletotrichum gloeosporioides; twig dieback and root rot caused by Rhizoctonia solani; and mushroom root rot, Armillariella (Clitocybe) tabescens (Morton, 1987).