Easier than it looks: Notes on the taxonomy of Typha L. (Typhaceae) in East Europe

High morphological variation of Typha L. species (Typhaceae) inspires some authors to describe new taxa. We aim to test genetic distinctiveness of some taxa reported in East Europe on morphological basis to verify their taxonomical status. We use sequences of intergenic spacer rpl32-trnL of cpDNA that was shown to be a reliable molecular marker in non-hybrid Typha species. We found that T. caspica Pobed., T. elata Boreau, T. incana Kapit. et Dyukina, T. krasnovae Doweld, T. rossica Krasnova are genetically identical to T. latifolia L., as well as T. foveolata Pobed., T. austro-orientalis Mavrodiev, T. elatior Boenn., T. angustata Bory et Chaub., T. linnaei Mavrodiev et Kapit. to T. angustifolia L. Thus, until some additional evidence of their distinctiveness is not found, we suggest to treat T. caspica, T. elata, T. krasnovae, T. rossica as synonyms of T. latifolia, while T. foveolata, T. austro-orientalis, T. elatior, T. angustata should be synonymized with T. angustifolia. Consequently, T. linnaei is a superfluous name (coined in attempts of neotypification T. angustifolia) and should be also considered synonymous to the latter. The hypothesis of hybrid origin of T. incana should be tested further with microsatellite DNA repeats - if correct, this would indicate T. latifolia as plastid donor.