Evolutionary history and species delimitations: a case study of the hazel dormouse, Muscardinus avellanarius

Robust identification of species and significant evolutionary units (ESUs) is essential to implement appropriate conservation strategies for endangered species. However, definitions of species or ESUs are numerous and sometimes controversial, which might lead to biased conclusions, with serious consequences for the management of endangered species. The hazel dormouse, an arboreal rodent of conservation concern throughout Europe is an ideal model species to investigate the relevance of species identification for conservation purposes. This species is a member of the Gliridae family, which is protected in Europe and seriously threatened in the northern part of its range. We assessed the extent of genetic subdivision in the hazel dormouse by sequencing one mitochondrial gene (cytb) and two nuclear genes (BFIBR, APOB) and genotyping 10 autosomal microsatellites. These data were analysed using a combination of phylogenetic analyses and species delimitation methods. Multilocus analyses revealed the presence of two genetically distinct lineages (approximately 11 % cytb genetic divergence, no nuclear alleles shared) for the hazel dormouse in Europe, which presumably diverged during the Late Miocene. The phylogenetic patterns suggests that Muscardinus avellanarius populations could be split into two cryptic species respectively distributed in western and central-eastern Europe and Anatolia. However, the comparison of several species definitions and methods estimated the number of species between 1 and 10. Our results revealed the difficulty in choosing and applying an appropriate criterion and markers to identify species and highlight the fact that consensus guidelines are essential for species delimitation in the future. In addition, this study contributes to a better knowledge about the evolutionary history of the species

Home-range use patterns and movements of the Siberian flying squirrel in urban forests: Effects of habitat composition and connectivity

Peer reviewe

The Effect of Map Boundary on Estimates of Landscape Resistance to Animal Movement

BACKGROUND: Artificial boundaries on a map occur when the map extent does not cover the entire area of study; edges on the map do not exist on the ground. These artificial boundaries might bias the results of animal dispersal models by creating artificial barriers to movement for model organisms where there are no barriers for real organisms. Here, we characterize the effects of artificial boundaries on calculations of landscape resistance to movement using circuit theory. We then propose and test a solution to artificially inflated resistance values whereby we place a buffer around the artificial boundary as a substitute for the true, but unknown, habitat. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We randomly assigned landscape resistance values to map cells in the buffer in proportion to their occurrence in the known map area. We used circuit theory to estimate landscape resistance to organism movement and gene flow, and compared the output across several scenarios: a habitat-quality map with artificial boundaries and no buffer, a map with a buffer composed of randomized habitat quality data, and a map with a buffer composed of the true habitat quality data. We tested the sensitivity of the randomized buffer to the possibility that the composition of the real but unknown buffer is biased toward high or low quality. We found that artificial boundaries result in an overestimate of landscape resistance. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Artificial map boundaries overestimate resistance values. We recommend the use of a buffer composed of randomized habitat data as a solution to this problem. We found that resistance estimated using the randomized buffer did not differ from estimates using the real data, even when the composition of the real data was varied. Our results may be relevant to those interested in employing Circuitscape software in landscape connectivity and landscape genetics studies

The influence of habitat structure on genetic differentiation in red fox populations in north-eastern Poland

The red fox (Vulpes vulpes) has the widest global distribution among terrestrial carnivore species, occupying most of the Northern Hemisphere in its native range. Because it carries diseases that can be transmitted to humans and domestic animals, it is important to gather information about their movements and dispersal in their natural habitat but it is difficult to do so at a broad scale with trapping and telemetry. In this study, we have described the genetic diversity and structure of red fox populations in six areas of north-eastern Poland, based on samples collected from 2002–2003. We tested 22 microsatellite loci isolated from the dog and the red fox genome to select a panel of nine polymorphic loci suitable for this study. Genetic differentiation between the six studied populations was low to moderate and analysis in Structure revealed a panmictic population in the region. Spatial autocorrelation among all individuals showed a pattern of decreasing relatedness with increasing distance and this was not significantly negative until 93 km, indicating a pattern of isolation-by-distance over a large area. However, there was no correlation between genetic distance and either Euclidean distance or least-cost path distance at the population level. There was a significant relationship between genetic distance and the proportion of large forests and water along the Euclidean distances. These types of habitats may influence dispersal paths taken by red foxes, which is useful information in terms of wildlife disease management

Grey squirrels in central Italy: a new threat for endemic red squirrel subspecies

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