Genetic models reveal historical patterns of sea lamprey population fluctuations within Lake Champlain

The origin of sea lamprey (Petromyzon marinus) in Lake Champlain has been heavily debated over the past decade. Given the lack of historical documentation, two competing hypotheses have emerged in the literature. First, it has been argued that the relatively recent population size increase and concomitant rise in wounding rates on prey populations are indicative of an invasive population that entered the lake through the Champlain Canal. Second, recent genetic evidence suggests a post-glacial colonization at the end of the Pleistocene, approximately 11,000 years ago. One limitation to resolving the origin of sea lamprey in Lake Champlain is a lack of historical and current measures of population size. In this study, the issue of population size was explicitly addressed using nuclear (nDNA) and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) markers to estimate historical demography with genetic models. Haplotype network analysis, mismatch analysis, and summary statistics based on mtDNA noncoding sequences for NCI (479 bp) and NCII (173 bp) all indicate a recent population expansion. Coalescent models based on mtDNA and nDNA identified two potential demographic events: a population decline followed by a very recent population expansion. The decline in effective population size may correlate with land-use and fishing pressure changes post-European settlement, while the recent expansion may be associated with the implementation of the salmonid stocking program in the 1970s. These results are most consistent with the hypothesis that sea lamprey are native to Lake Champlain; however, the credibility intervals around parameter estimates demonstrate that there is uncertainty regarding the magnitude and timing of past demographic events

Patterns, causes, and consequences of marine larval dispersal

Quantifying the probability of larval exchange among marine populations is key to predicting local population dynamics and optimizing networks of marine protected areas. The pattern of connectivity among populations can be described by the measurement of a dispersal kernel. However, a statistically robust, empirical dispersal kernel has been lacking for any marine species. Here, we use genetic parentage analysis to quantify a dispersal kernel for the reef fish Elacatinus lori, demonstrating that dispersal declines exponentially with distance. The spatial scale of dispersal is an order of magnitude less than previous estimates—the median dispersal distance is just 1.7 km and no dispersal events exceed 16.4 km despite intensive sampling out to 30 km from source. Overlaid on this strong pattern is subtle spatial variation, but neither pelagic larval duration nor direction is associated with the probability of successful dispersal. Given the strong relationship between distance and dispersal, we show that distance-driven logistic models have strong power to predict dispersal probabilities. Moreover, connectivity matrices generated from these models are congruent with empirical estimates of spatial genetic structure, suggesting that the pattern of dispersal we uncovered reflects long-term patterns of gene flow. These results challenge assumptions regarding the spatial scale and presumed predictors of marine population connectivity. We conclude that if marine reserve networks aim to connect whole communities of fishes and conserve biodiversity broadly, then reserves that are close in space (<10 km) will accommodate those members of the community that are short-distance dispersers