An Analysis of Geographic Variation in Mice of the Peromyscus polionotus Group from Florida and Alabama

Evidence of Adaptation From Ancestral Variation in Young Populations of Beach Mice

“…Experimental work showed that natural selection for crypsis, via predation by visual hunters, acts on differences in pigmentation between mainland and beach forms (Vignieri et al 2010). Along Florida's Gulf shoreline, there are five subspecies of beach mice; although all beach mice have lighter pelage than their mainland counterparts, each subspecies shows a unique color pattern (Sumner 1926; Mullen et al 2009). A single mutation in the coding region of the melanocortin‐1 receptor ( Mc1r ) has been identified and shown to contribute to differences between Santa Rosa Island beach mice (SRIBM) ( P. p. leucocephalus ), the lightest of the beach subspecies, and mainland mice ( P. p. subgriseus ) (Hoekstra et al 2006).…”

Color Variation in the Round‐Tailed Horned Lizard, Phrynosoma Modestum

“…Dice and Blossom (1937), studying color-variation in Peromyscus and certain other mice in southwestern United States, have shown that there is a strong correlation between the pelage-color in local races and the color of the soil or rock on which they are found, an observation similar to that of Benson (1933), who used a less precise means for comparison of colors. That such variation in color has a genetic basis was quiteclearly shown by Sumner ( 1930), who worked with Peromyscus under roughly analogous circumstances in southeastern United States (see also Sumner 1926). The latter work also demonstrated that the differences in color that characterize subspecific populations, and which generally appear to be adaptive, may be accompanied by heritable and seemingly nonadaptive differences in numerous morphometric characters.…”

“…The problem of color-adaptation in reptiles is somewhat confused by the fact that they, unlike birds and mammals, are supplied with pigmentary effector systems that enable individuals to change color, sometimes very rapidly. Such color-change may be invoked as a means of concealment for an individual moving from one background to another, although this has not been decisively demonstrated for any species of lizard (see, however, Sumner 1934 and1935). The evolution of s:1ch a mechanism (denied to birds and mammals) would seem to take precedence over the genetic fixation of one particular color, however well matched to the background, under any environmental conditions whatever, or at least in any environment in which the background color is not absolutely uniform from place to place within the area ordinarily covered in the excursions of a single individual throughout its life.…”

Sixty polymorphic microsatellite markers for the oldfield mouse developed in Peromyscus polionotus and Peromyscus maniculatus

“…Peromyscus polionotus has also colonized the primary dunes and barrier islands on the Gulf coast of Florida and Alabama as well as coastal dunes in northeastern Florida. In these regions, there are several P. polionotus subspecies (termed ‘beach mice’) originally described based on their cryptic dorsal pelage (Sumner 1926; Bowen 1968). Six of the seven beach mouse subspecies are classified as endangered or threatened (US Fish and Wildlife Service, 1985; Oli et al .…”