Li Yuehui, Li Nana, Chen Long, Li Yueyuan, Xiong Zaiping, Hu Yuanman
CAS Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Management, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 72 Wenhua Road, Shenhe District, Shenyang 110016, China.
School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary, University of London, Mile End Road, London E1 4NS, UK.
Animals (Basel). 2020 Jul 3;10(7):1135. doi: 10.3390/ani10071135.
It is necessary to estimate the population abundance of deer for managing their populations. However, most estimates are from high-density populations inhabiting the forests of North America or Europe; there is currently a lack of necessary knowledge regarding low-density deer populations in different forest habitats. In this article, we used fecal DNA based on the capture-mark-recapture method to estimate the population abundance of Siberian roe deer ( ) in Liangshui National Nature Reserve in the Lesser Xing'an Mountains, northeast China, where the deer population was found to be of a low density by limited studies. We used a robust survey design to collect 422 fecal pellet groups in 2016 and extracted DNA from those samples, generating 265 different genotypes; we thus identified 77 deer individuals based on six microsatellite markers (Roe1, Roe8, Roe9, BM757, MB25 and OarFCB304). With capture and recapture records of these 77 individuals, the abundance of roe deer was estimated to be 87 deer (80-112, 95% CI) using the Program CAPTURE. Using an effective sampling area which resulted from the mean maximum recapture distance (MMRD), we converted the population abundance to a density of 2.9 deer/km (2.7-3.7, 95% CI). Our study estimated the roe deer population abundance by a feces-based capture-mark-recapture approach in northeast China, successfully demonstrating the applicability of non-invasive genetic sampling in monitoring populations of deer in this area, which contributes to the development of low-density deer population ecology and management.
为了对鹿群进行管理，有必要估计鹿的种群数量。然而，大多数估计数据来自北美或欧洲森林中的高密度鹿群；目前对于不同森林栖息地中低密度鹿群的相关必要知识还很缺乏。在本文中，我们基于捕获-标记-重捕法，利用粪便DNA来估计中国东北小兴安岭凉水国家级自然保护区内狍（）的种群数量，此前有限的研究表明该地区的鹿群密度较低。我们采用了稳健的调查设计，在2016年收集了422组粪便样本，并从这些样本中提取DNA，得到了265种不同的基因型；因此，我们基于6个微卫星标记（Roe1、Roe8、Roe9、BM757、MB25和OarFCB304）识别出了77只狍个体。利用这77只个体的捕获和重捕记录，使用CAPTURE程序估计狍的种群数量为87只（80 - 112只，95%置信区间）。利用由平均最大重捕距离（MMRD）得出的有效采样面积，我们将种群数量转换为密度为2.9只/km（2.7 - 3.7只/km，95%置信区间）。我们的研究通过基于粪便的捕获-标记-重捕方法对中国东北地区的狍种群数量进行了估计，成功证明了非侵入性基因采样在该地区鹿群监测中的适用性，这有助于低密度鹿群生态学和管理的发展。
