Mountain ungulate mating systems: patterns and processes

Corlatti, Luca; Lovari, Sandro

doi:10.1111/mam.12319

Cited by 5 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 116 publications

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“…S8, Supplementary Material online). These values suggest smaller male N e , consistent with the polygynous mating structure in sheep ( Corlatti and Lovari 2023 ). However, the lineages also varied among themselves: we found that the autosomal/chrX diversity ratios were closest to 1 in the N. American/Siberian group, followed by the EUM and ARG.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 73%

Population Genomic History of the Endangered Anatolian and Cyprian Mouflons in Relation to Worldwide Wild, Feral, and Domestic Sheep Lineages

Atağ,

Kaptan,

Yüncü

et al. 2024

Genome Biology and Evolution

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Once widespread in their homelands, the Anatolian mouflon (Ovis gmelini anatolica) and the Cyprian mouflon (Ovis gmelini ophion) were driven to near extinction during the 20th century and are currently listed as endangered populations by the IUCN. While the exact origins of these lineages remain unclear, they have been suggested to be close relatives of domestic sheep or remnants of proto-domestic sheep. Here, we study whole genome sequences of n = 5 Anatolian mouflons and n = 10 Cyprian mouflons in terms of population history and diversity, comparing them to eight other extant sheep lineages. We find reciprocal genetic affinity between Anatolian and Cyprian mouflons and domestic sheep, higher than all other studied wild sheep genomes, including the Iranian mouflon (Ovis gmelini). Studying diversity indices, we detect a considerable load of short runs of homozygosity (ROH) blocks (<2 Mb) in both Anatolian and Cyprian mouflons, reflecting small effective population size (Ne). Meanwhile, Ne as well as mutation load estimates are lower in Cyprian compared to Anatolian mouflons, suggesting the purging of recessive deleterious variants in Cyprian sheep under a small long-term Ne, possibly attributable to founder effects, island isolation, introgression from domestic lineages, or differences in their bottleneck dynamics. Expanding our analyses to worldwide wild and feral Ovis genomes, we observe varying viability metrics among different lineages, and a limited consistency between viability metrics and IUCN conservation status. Factors such as recent inbreeding, introgression, and unique population dynamics may have contributed to the observed disparities.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 73%

Population Genomic History of the Endangered Anatolian and Cyprian Mouflons in Relation to Worldwide Wild, Feral, and Domestic Sheep Lineages

Atağ,

Kaptan,

Yüncü

et al. 2024

Genome Biology and Evolution

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Ecological drivers of sexual size dimorphism in northern chamois

Reiner,

Corlatti

2024

Ecology and Evolution

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Male‐biased sexual size dimorphism (SSD) is common in ungulates. The dominant scenario for the evolution of ungulate SSD suggests that habitat openness leads to greater SSD by increasing group size and thus sexual selection through male–male competition for mates. At a more proximate level, adaptive changes in SSD may result from the plastic response of individuals to environmental variation. In this study, we used 161,948 body mass data from a seasonally size‐dimorphic species, the northern chamois Rupicapra rupicapra, to examine the role of forest cover and other environmental variables in the expression of SSD. Data were collected from individuals hunted in the Austrian Alps, grouped into 28 mountain ranges with different forest cover, geological substrate and population density. Population‐specific growth curves were fitted using monomolecular models, and SSD was calculated as the log‐transformed ratio of male to female asymptotic body mass. A path model in which environmental factors indirectly influenced SSD via male or female body mass suggested that SSD increased with increasing density via reduced female body mass and decreased on siliceous substrates via reduced male body mass. Forest cover was negatively associated with body mass in both sexes, but not with variation in SSD.

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Sexual selection and species recognition promote complex male courtship displays in ungulates

D’Ammando,

Bro-Jørgensen

2024

Behavioral Ecology

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Identifying the evolutionary drivers of sexual signal complexity is a key challenge in the study of animal communication. Among mammals, male bovids and cervids often perform elaborate gestural displays during courtship, consisting of ritualized movements of various parts of the body but the causes underlying interspecific variation in complexity of such displays remain poorly understood. Here we apply the comparative method to investigate which factors may have either promoted or constrained gestural repertoire size. We found that sexual selection was a strong predictor of gestural display complexity in male bovids and cervids. Repertoire size was positively correlated with breeding group size, an indicator of the intensity of sexual selection on males. Moreover, repertoires were larger in species adopting non-territorial and lek breeding mating systems than in species adopting resource-defence territoriality, a finding that can be explained by more emphasis on direct benefits than indirect benefits in resource-defence systems, where male mating success may also be less skewed due to difficulty in monopolising mates. The results also indicate that gestural repertoire size was positively correlated with the number of closely-related species occurring in sympatry. This is consistent with display complexity being selected to facilitate species recognition during courtship and thereby avoid interspecific hybridization. At the same time, repertoire size was negatively associated with male body mass, possibly due to the energetic and mechanical constraints imposed on movements in very large species. By contrast, we found no evidence that the habitat drives selection for complex gestural courtship displays.

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Mountain ungulate mating systems: patterns and processes

Cited by 5 publications

References 116 publications

Population Genomic History of the Endangered Anatolian and Cyprian Mouflons in Relation to Worldwide Wild, Feral, and Domestic Sheep Lineages

Population Genomic History of the Endangered Anatolian and Cyprian Mouflons in Relation to Worldwide Wild, Feral, and Domestic Sheep Lineages

Ecological drivers of sexual size dimorphism in northern chamois

Sexual selection and species recognition promote complex male courtship displays in ungulates

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