Abstract
Gypsophila paniculata (baby’s breath) is an invasive species found throughout much of the northwest United States and western Canada. Two distinct color morphs of baby’s breath were identified in areas within the coastal dunes along eastern Lake Michigan. The more common morph produces stems that are purple in color (purple morph), while the atypical morph has stems that are green-yellow (green-yellow morph). The purpose of this study was to characterize these morphs and determine if they are genetically distinct species in order to assess whether alternative management strategies should be employed to control these populations. We sequenced two chloroplast regions, RbcL and MatK, and one nuclear region, ITS2, from the purple morphs and green-yellow morphs collected from Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, MI, USA. Sequences were aligned with reference G. paniculata and G. elegans sequences obtained from GenBank and the Barcode of Life (BOLD) databases. Phylogenetic analyses suggest that the two color morphs belong to G. paniculata and do not appear to be distinct genetic strains. We propose that current management practices continue to treat the two color morphs in a similar manner in terms of removal to prevent the further spread of this species.