Conservation genetics of the pond bat (Myotis dasycneme) with special focus on the populations in northwestern Germany and in Jutland, Denmark

Abstract

Conservation genetics is important in the management of endangered species, helping to understand their connectivity and long‐term viability, thus identifying populations of importance for conservation. The pond bat ( Myotis dasycneme ) is a rare species classified as “Near Threatened” with a wide but patchy Palearctic distribution. A total of 277 samples representing populations in Denmark, Germany, Latvia, Hungary, and Russia were used in the genetic analyses; 224 samples representing Denmark, Germany, and Russia were analyzed at 10 microsatellite loci; 241 samples representing all areas were analyzed using mitochondrial D‐loop and cytochrome B sequences. A Bayesian clustering approach revealed two poorly resolved clusters, one representing the Danish and German groups and the other the Russian group. However, significantly different pairwise F ST and D EST estimates were observed between the Danish and German groups and between the Danish and Russian groups suggesting a recent population structure. These conflicting results might be attributed to the effect of migration or low resolution due to the number of microsatellite markers used. After concatenating the two mitochondrial sequences, analysis detected significant genetic differentiation between all populations, probably due to genetic drift combined with a founder event. The phylogenetic tree suggested a closer relationship between the Russian and Northern European populations compared to the Hungarian population, implying that the latter belongs to an older ancestral population. This was supported by the observed haplotype network and higher nucleotide diversity in this population. The genetic structuring observed in the Danish/German pond bat stresses the need for a cross‐border management between the two countries. Further, the pronounced mtDNA structuring, together with the indicated migration between nearby populations suggest philopatric female behavior but male migration, emphasizes the importance of protecting suitable habitat mosaics to maintain a continuum of patches with dense pond bat populations across the species' distribution range.

Population genetic structure based on mitochondrial DNA analysis of Ikonnikov’s whiskered bat (Myotis ikonnikovi—Chiroptera: Vespertilionidae) from Korea

“…The genetic diversity of the Korean M. ikonnikovi populations based on Cytb sequences was higher than that calculated using COI sequences; this result is similar to that of Russian populations of Myotis dasycneme (Andersen et al 2019). Other cases of high genetic diversity that are similar to that of the M. ikonnikovi populations herein include Myotis lucifugus and Myotis septentrionalis inhabiting North America; these species, however, were examined using the mitochondrial control region (Johnson et al 2015).…”

DNA-barcoding and a new data about the karyotype of Myotis petax (Chiroptera, Vespertilionidae) in the Russian Far East

“…At the same time the haplotype diversity of cyt b gene described for European M. myotis was amounted to P = 0.491 (Ruedi and Castella 2003), and for M. dasycneme was P = 0.335-0.868 (Andersen et al 2018). On the other hand, the nucleotide diversity of M. petax is lower than that of M. ikonnikovi (π between 0.00163 to 0.00878) and is comparable with the nucleotide diversity of cyt b of M. myotis (π between 0.0003 to 0.0028) and M. dasycneme (π between 0.0004 to 0.0029) (Ruedi and Castella 2003, Andersen et al 2018, Park et al 2019.…”