Abstract
Competition experiments between several Drosophila pseudoobscura strains that were previously subjected to periodic bottlenecks of different sizes and D. willistoni have been carried out. Contrary to previous results with these two species, where stable coexistence was detected, populations of D. pseudoobscura displaced D. willistoni in a few generations. By using a relative fitness measure, the control lines (that had not gone through bottlenecks) outcompeted D. willistoni faster than bottlenecked lines. One of these, corresponding to the minimum possible bottleneck size of one pair, also shows significantly lower relative fitness than the other strains. These results are discussed in relation to the effect of periodic bottlenecks in reducing genetic variability and its incidence on the competitive ability of these lines.
Similar content being viewed by others
Article PDF
References
Arthur, W. 1982. The evolutionary consequences of interspecific competition. Adv Ecol Res, 12, 127–187.
Ayala, F J. 1965. Relative fitness of populations of Drosophila serrata and Drosophila birchii. Genetics, 51, 527–544.
Ayala, F J. 1966. Dynamics of populations. I. Factors controlling population growth and population size in Drosophila serrata. Am Nat, 100, 333–344.
Ayala, F J. 1969. Genetic polymorphism and interspecific competitive ability in Drosophila. Genet Res, 14, 95–102.
Ayala, F J. 1971. Competition between species: Frequency dependence. Science, 171, 820–824.
Ayala, F J, Gilpin, M E, and Ehrenfeld, J G. 1973. Competition between species: Theoretical models and experimental tests. Theor Pop Biol, 4, 331–356.
Barker, J S F. 1983. Interspecific competition. In: Ashburner, M., Carson, H. L, and Thompson Jr, J. N. (eds) The Genetics and Biology of Drosophila, vol. 3c. Academic Press, London, pp. 285–341.
Beardmore, J A. 1983. Extinction, survival and genetic variation. In: Schonewald-Cox, C. M., Chambers, S. M., MacBryde, and Thomas, L. (eds) Genetics and Conservation, The Benjamin/Cummings Publishing Company, Inc., pp. 125–151.
Bryant, E H, McCommas, S A, and Combs, L M. 1986. The effect of an experimental bottleneck upon quantitative genetic variation on the housefly. Genetics, 114, 1191–1211.
Carson, H L. 1961. Heterosis and fitness in experimental populations of Drosophila melanogaster. Evolution, 15, 496–509.
Carson, H L. 1968. The population flush and its genetic consequences. In: Lewontin, R. C. (ed.) Population Biology and Evolution, Syracuse University Press, Syracuse, New York, pp. 123–137.
Carson, H L. 1971. Speciation and the founder principle. Stadler Genet Symp Univ Missouri, 3, 51–70.
Carson, H L, and Templeton, A R. 1984. Genetic revolutions in relation to speciation phenomena: the founding of new populations. Ann Rev Ecol Syst, 7, 311–346.
Falconer, D S. 1989. Introduction to Quantitative Genetics, 3rd edn. Longman Press, Oxford.
Frankel, O H, and Soulé, M E. 1981. Conservation and Evolution. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Franklin, I R. 1980. Evolutionary change in small populations. In: Soulé, M. and Wilcox, B. (ed.), Conservation Biology: An Evolutionary Ecological Perspective, Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, MA, pp. 135–149.
Galiana, A, Ayala, F J, and Moya, A. 1989. Flush-crash experiments in Drosophila. In: Fontdevila, A. (ed.) Evolutionary Biology of Transient Unstable Populations, Springer-Verlag, Berlin, pp. 58–73.
Goldstein, L. 1953. Recherches sur les populations mixtes expérimentales de Drosophila melanogaster et Drosophila simulons. Int Cong Genet Bellagio (Como) PartII, 668–670.
Goodnight, J C. 1988. Epistasis and the effect of founder events on the additive genetic variance. Evolution, 39, 1380–1383.
Maruyama, T, and Fuerst, P. 1984. Population bottlenecks and non equilibrium models. I. Allele numbers when populations evolve from zero variability. Genetics, 108, 745–763.
Maruyama, T, and Fuerst, P. 1985a. Population bottlenecks and non equilibrium models.II. Number of alleles in a small population that was formed by a recent bottleneck. Genetics, 111, 675–689.
Maruyama, T, and Fuerst, P. 1985b. Population bottlenecks and non equilibrium models.III. Genie homozygosity in populations which experience periodic bottlenecks. Genetics, 111, 691–703.
Mueller, L D, and Ayala, F J. 1981. Dynamics of single-species population growth: Experimental and statistical analysis. Theor Pop Biol, 20, 101–117.
Mueller, L D, Gonzélez-Candelas, F, and Sweet, V F. 1991. Components of density-dependent population dynamics: models and tests with Drosophila. Am Nat, 137, 457–475.
Nei, M, Maruyama, T, and Chakraborty, R. 1975. The bottleneck effect and genetic variability in populations. Evolution, 29, 1–10.
Shugart, H H, Jr, and Blaylock, B G. 1973. The niche-varia-tion hypothesis: an experimental study with Drosophila populations. Am Nat, 107, 575–579.
Wright, S. 1938. Size of population and breeding structure in relation to evolution. Science, 87, 430–431.
Zimmering, S. 1948. Competition between Drosophila pseudoobscura and Drosophila melanogaster in population cages. Am Nat, 82, 326–330.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions. JALB was supported by a fellowship from the Spanish Ministerio de Education y Ciencia (Formation de Personal Investigador).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Bueno, J., Moya, A. & González-candelas, F. The effect of periodic bottlenecks on the competitive ability of Drosophila pseudoobscura lines. Heredity 70, 60–66 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1038/hdy.1993.8
Received:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/hdy.1993.8