Chen Rebecca S, Soulsbury Carl D, Lebigre Christophe, Ludwig Gilbert, van Oers Kees, Hoffman Joseph I
Department of Animal Behaviour University of Bielefeld Bielefeld Germany.
School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Joseph Banks Laboratories University of Lincoln Lincoln UK.
Evol Appl. 2022 Dec 26;16(3):625-637. doi: 10.1111/eva.13521. eCollection 2023 Mar.
Intensive hunting activities such as commercial fishing and trophy hunting can have profound influences on natural populations. However, less intensive recreational hunting can also have subtle effects on animal behaviour, habitat use and movement, with implications for population persistence. Lekking species such as the black grouse () may be especially prone to hunting as leks are temporally and spatially predictable, making them easy targets. Furthermore, inbreeding in black grouse is mainly avoided through female-biased dispersal, so any disruptions to dispersal caused by hunting could lead to changes in gene flow, increasing the risk of inbreeding. We therefore investigated the impact of hunting on genetic diversity, inbreeding and dispersal on a metapopulation of black grouse in Central Finland. We genotyped 1065 adult males and 813 adult females from twelve lekking sites (six hunted, six unhunted) and 200 unrelated chicks from seven sites (two hunted, five unhunted) at up to thirteen microsatellite loci. Our initial confirmatory analysis of sex-specific fine-scale population structure revealed little genetic structure in the metapopulation. Levels of inbreeding did not differ significantly between hunted and unhunted sites in neither adults nor chicks. However, immigration rates into hunted sites were significantly higher among adults compared to immigration into unhunted sites. We conclude that the influx of migrants into hunted sites may compensate for the loss of harvested individuals, thereby increasing gene flow and mitigating inbreeding. Given the absence of any obvious barriers to gene flow in Central Finland, a spatially heterogeneous matrix of hunted and unhunted regions may be crucial to ensure sustainable harvests into the future.
诸如商业捕鱼和战利品狩猎等高强度狩猎活动会对自然种群产生深远影响。然而，强度较低的休闲狩猎也可能对动物行为、栖息地利用和移动产生微妙影响，进而影响种群的持续性。像黑琴鸡（）这样的求偶场物种可能特别容易受到狩猎影响，因为求偶场在时间和空间上具有可预测性，使其成为容易攻击的目标。此外，黑琴鸡主要通过雌性偏向扩散来避免近亲繁殖，因此狩猎对扩散造成的任何干扰都可能导致基因流动的变化，增加近亲繁殖的风险。因此，我们研究了狩猎对芬兰中部黑琴鸡集合种群的遗传多样性、近亲繁殖和扩散的影响。我们对来自12个求偶场（6个被狩猎，6个未被狩猎）的1065只成年雄性和813只成年雌性以及来自7个地点（2个被狩猎，五个未被狩猎）的200只无亲缘关系的雏鸡，在多达13个微卫星位点进行了基因分型。我们最初对性别特异性精细尺度种群结构的验证性分析表明，集合种群中几乎没有遗传结构。在成年个体和雏鸡中，被狩猎和未被狩猎地点的近亲繁殖水平均无显著差异。然而，与未被狩猎地点相比，成年个体迁入被狩猎地点的比率显著更高。我们得出结论，迁入被狩猎地点的移民流入可能弥补被捕捞个体的损失，从而增加基因流动并减轻近亲繁殖。鉴于芬兰中部不存在任何明显的基因流动障碍，被狩猎和未被狩猎区域在空间上的异质矩阵对于确保未来的可持续收获可能至关重要。
