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Ecological and genetic spatial structuring in the Canadian lynx

Nature volume 425, pages 69–72 (2003)Cite this article

Abstract

The Canadian lynx, distributed all across the northern part of North America, is well known for its regular population cycles—cycles that have different underlying structures in different parts of Canada1. Using both nuclear and mitochondrial DNA markers, we report here a close resemblance between the earlier observed spatial ecological structuring of the Canadian lynx1 and its spatial genetic structuring. Specifically, we demonstrate that the Rocky Mountains represent a barrier to gene flow in western Canada, and, somewhat surprisingly, we detect the presence of a geographically invisible barrier south of Hudson Bay (coinciding with the separation between the ecological Continental and Atlantic regions1). No evidence for isolation in different glacial refugia within North America was found. We suggest that ecological factors underlying the spatial dynamic structuring also strongly influence the genetic structuring of the Canadian lynx.

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Figure 1: Distribution of the sample localities.
Figure 2: Linearized FST plotted against geographical distances between samples.
Figure 3: Distribution of mtDNA haplotypes.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the wildlife managers and trappers that participated in the sampling, especially D. F. McAlpine, R. Lafond, C. Heydon, B. Verbiwski, A. Arsenault, R. Mulders, P. W. Cotter, M. Badry, C. Apps and T. Shury. We also thank Ø. Flagstad and D. Ehrich for discussions. This work was supported by the University of Oslo and the Norwegian Research Council.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biology, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1031, Blindern, N-0315, Oslo, Norway

    Eli Knispel Rueness, Nils Chr. Stenseth & Kjetill S. Jakobsen

  2. Yukon Department of Environment, Fish and Wildlife Branch, P.O. Box 310, Mayo, Y0B 1M0, Yukon, Canada

    Mark O'Donoghue

  3. Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, Alberta, T6G 2E9, Edmonton, Canada

    Stan Boutin

  4. Department of Evolutionary Biology, Uppsala University, Nordbyvägen 18D, SE 752 36, Uppsala, Sweden

    Hans Ellegren

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  1. Eli Knispel Rueness
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Correspondence to Nils Chr. Stenseth.

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Rueness, E., Stenseth, N., O'Donoghue, M. et al. Ecological and genetic spatial structuring in the Canadian lynx. Nature 425, 69–72 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01942

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