Genetic population structure across a range of geographic scales in the commercially exploited marine gastropod Buccinum undatum

Abstract

MEPS Marine Ecology Progress Series Contact the journal Facebook Twitter RSS Mailing List Subscribe to our mailing list via Mailchimp HomeLatest VolumeAbout the JournalEditorsTheme Sections MEPS 317:157-169 (2006) - doi:10.3354/meps317157 Genetic population structure across a range of geographic scales in the commercially exploited marine gastropod Buccinum undatum D. Weetman1,*, L. Hauser1,2, M. K. Bayes3, J. R. Ellis4, P. W. Shaw3 1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Hull, Hull HU6 7RX, UK 2School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences, University of Washington, 1122 NE Boat Street, Box 355020, Seattle, Washington 98195-5020, USA 3School of Biological Sciences, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surrey TW20 0EX, UK 4Centre for Environmental Fisheries and Aquaculture Sciences, (CEFAS) Lowestoft Laboratory, Lowestoft, Suffolk NR33 0HT, UK *Email: dweetman@hotmail.co.uk ABSTRACT: Marine invertebrates are exploited increasingly as food resources worldwide, but knowledge of genetic population structure is limited for most commercially valuable taxa. We investigated genetic structure in the widely distributed, subtidal gastropod Buccinum undatum by screening samples from 28 locations at 5 microsatellite loci. Multidimensional scaling and cluster analysis were applied to study macrogeographic structure, and revealed 4 well-supported groupings of populations: Canada, Iceland, Swedish Skaggerak, and a cluster containing most samples from the European continental shelf (hereafter ‘Shelf’). A fifth cluster comprising all 5 samples from the Solent (UK) relied on exceptional differentiation of just 2 alleles, which is consistent with significant evidence for recent bottlenecks in this area. Within the Shelf cluster most pairwise tests of differentiation were significant, although the global FST of 0.014 was very low for a direct-developing species. Our data suggest that use of highly polymorphic markers caused a relatively minor downward bias to FST, although historical connectivity of populations that are not in migration-drift equilibrium might be more important. However, significant isolation by distance among British North Sea coast samples (FST = 0.010) is consistent with approach to equilibrium and suggests recent gene flow, probably between semi-continuous populations. At a microgeographic scale, we found migration to be consistently higher from inshore to offshore within 3 separate areas; a factor that may underpin the lower diversity and greater differentiation observed for bay and inlet populations. Such populations might serve as important sources of genetic diversity, but are likely to be particularly vulnerable to exploitation. KEY WORDS: Fishery genetics · Whelk · Microsatellites · Isolation by distance · Asymmetric migration · Bottleneck Full text in pdf format PreviousNextExport citation RSS - Facebook - Tweet - linkedIn Cited by Published in MEPS Vol. 317. Online publication date: July 18, 2006 Print ISSN: 0171-8630; Online ISSN: 1616-1599 Copyright © 2006 Inter-Research.