BioInvasions Records (2019) Volume 8, Issue 1: 175–189 CORRECTED PROOF Research Article “Flying under the radar” – how misleading distributional data led to wrong appreciation of knotweeds invasion (Reynoutria spp.) in Croatia Nina Vuković1, Vedran Šegota1, Antun Alegro1,*, Nikola Koletić1, Anja Rimac1 and Stjepan Dekanić2 1University of Zagreb, Department of Biology, Division of Botany, Marulićev trg 20/II, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia 2Perceptives Ltd., Koprivnička ulica 38, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia Author e-mails:
[email protected] (NV),
[email protected] (VS),
[email protected] (AA),
[email protected] (NK),
[email protected] (AR),
[email protected] (SD) *Corresponding author Citation: Vuković N, Šegota V, Alegro A, Koletić N, Rimac A, Dekanić S (2019) Abstract “Flying under the radar” – how misleading th distributional data led to wrong Knotweeds were introduced into Europe in the 19 century and soon after became appreciation of knotweeds invasion aggressive invaders. While R. japonica and R. sachalinensis arrived from Asia, (Reynoutria spp.) in Croatia. BioInvasions their hybrid Reynoutria × bohemica is believed to originate from the introduced Records 8(1): 175–189, range. Revised material shows that R. × bohemica has occurred in Europe since at https://doi.org/10.3391/bir.2019.8.1.19 least 1872, but was frequently misidentified as one of the parents. For that reason, Received: 15 January 2018 the hybrid was detected relatively late in many European countries, meaning that it Accepted: 29 October 2018 was silently spreading throughout the region for a long time. The present study was Published: 12 February 2019 conducted in Croatia, where the parental species have been recorded since the 19th Handling editor: Giuseppe Brundu century, the hybrid, however, not being recognized until very recently, although it Thematic editor: Stelios Katsanevakis has probably been present for decades.