Abstract
BackgroundUnderstanding how past climatic oscillations have affected organismic evolution will help predict the impact that current climate change has on living organisms. The European turtle dove, Streptopelia turtur, is a warm-temperature adapted species and a long distance migrant that uses multiple flyways to move between Europe and Africa. Despite being abundant, it is categorized as vulnerable because of a long-term demographic decline. We studied the demographic history and population genetic structure of the European turtle dove using genomic data and mitochondrial DNA sequences from individuals sampled across Europe, and performing paleoclimatic niche modelling simulations.ResultsOverall our data suggest that this species is panmictic across Europe, and is not genetically structured across flyways. We found the genetic signatures of demographic fluctuations, inferring an effective population size (Ne) expansion that occurred between the late Pleistocene and early Holocene, followed by a decrease in the Ne that started between the mid Holocene and the present. Our niche modelling analyses suggest that the variations in the Ne are coincident with recent changes in the availability of suitable habitat.ConclusionsWe argue that the European turtle dove is prone to undergo demographic fluctuations, a trait that makes it sensitive to anthropogenic impacts, especially when its numbers are decreasing. Also, considering the lack of genetic structure, we suggest all populations across Europe are equally relevant for conservation.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12862-016-0817-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Understanding how past climatic oscillations have affected organismic evolution will help predict the impact that current climate change has on living organisms
We explored the demographic history of the turtle dove by performing an Extended Bayesian Skyline plot (EBSP), as implemented in BEAST version 1.8.2 [40]
Summary statistics and population genetic structure Cytochrome b sequences were highly polymorphic, with 73 segregating sites and 40 haplotypes found among 95 turtle dove individuals (haplotype diversity (Hd): 0.92; nucleotide diversity (π): 0.0075)
Summary
Understanding how past climatic oscillations have affected organismic evolution will help predict the impact that current climate change has on living organisms. The European turtle dove, Streptopelia turtur, is a warm-temperature adapted species and a long distance migrant that uses multiple flyways to move between Europe and Africa. Similar strategies have been observed in other long distance migratory birds across the world (e.g. North American’s Swainson’s thrush, Catharus ustulatus, [20]; the Asian greenish warbler, Phylloscopus trochiloides, [21]). In some cases, such alternative flyways might be mirrored in the breeding grounds in the form of migratory divides, defined as narrow regions of contact between populations with different migratory pathways [22]. The presence of alternative flyways and migratory divides has been postulated as a mechanism promoting intraspecific genetic diversification [23]
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