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Differentiation of North African foxes and population genetic dynamics in the desert—insights into the evolutionary history of two sister taxa, Vulpes rueppellii and Vulpes vulpes

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Abstract

The effects of Pleistocene glaciations on moulding biodiversity have been extensively investigated within temperate biomes, yet arid ecosystems are largely neglected. A clear example comes from North Africa and the successive range of expansion/contraction cycles of the Sahara desert. This study focuses on North African foxes (genus Vulpes), in particular two sister taxa, Vulpes rueppellii and Vulpes vulpes, but also Vulpes zerda and Vulpes pallida. A set of two mitochondrial markers (Cyt-b and D-loop) and 31–33 autosomal microsatellites were used to conduct phylogenetic and population analyses, as well as to investigate the possible occurrence of hybridisation events. Phylogenetic analysis revealed V. rueppellii to be more closely related to North African V. vulpes than the latter with Eurasian V. vulpes, along with the occurrence of two sub-clades of V. vulpes within the Maghreb. In contrast, microsatellite analysis identified V. rueppellii and V. vulpes as clearly separate entities, and no sign of population structure was observed for both species within North Africa. Both mitochondrial and nuclear markers separated North African and Eurasian V. vulpes in two distinct groups. We propose two explanatory scenarios, both influenced by past climatic shifts: (1) past introgression of V. vulpes mitochondrial genome into V. rueppellii and (2) V. rueppellii represents an arid ecotype of V. vulpes trapped in the Sahara during a humid/arid transition. The successive expansions/contractions of the Sahara were also likely responsible for the mitochondrial structure of North African V. vulpes. We unveil intriguing insights on the genetic structure of carnivore species in North Africa, suggesting that further integrative research is needed.

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Acknowledgments

Samples for this study were collected with partial support of grants from the National Geographic Society (Commission on Research and Exploration, grants 7629-04 and 8412-08), Mohammed bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund (projects 11052709, 11052707 and 11052499) and a project from FCT, Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (PTDC/BIA-BEC/099934/2008) through EU Programme COMPETE. Logistic support for fieldwork was given by Pedro Santos Lda (Trimble GPS), Off Road Power Shop, L.O. Yarba (Parc National du Banc d’Arguin), A. Araújo (MAVA-Fondation pour la Nature) and S.M. Ould Lehlou (Ministère de l’Environnement et du Développement Durable of Mauritania). We are thankful to A. Kaliontzopoulou, A. Van der Meijden, F. Martínez-Freiría, H. Yusefi, J. Maia, K. de Smet, M. Carretero, P. Sousa, S. Ferreira and S. Larbes for generously providing additional samples. We acknowledge all members of the BIODESERTS research group from CIBIO/InBIO that helped in the West Africa field work. We are also grateful to D. Castro, P. Ribeiro, S. Lopes and S. Mourão for assistance in the lab. Analyses were done at the CITES registered laboratory: 13PT0065/S. We gratefully acknowledge Mark. J. Statham and an anonymous reviewer for detailed commentaries that considerably improved the quality of this manuscript. We also acknowledge Mark J. Statham for assistance with geographical location of samples from his work. Analyses were carried out by using the resources available on Bioportal (https://www.bioportal.uio.no/) at the University of Oslo, funded by MLS and USIT and also at the Evolutionary Genetics Core Facility and the Cornell Biological Resource Centre. GVA, JCB and RG are supported by IF Research contracts from FCT (IF/01425/2014, IF/00459/2013 and IF/00564/2012, respectively).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Ethics approval

No animal was sacrificed and there were no animal husbandry, experimentation and care/welfare concerns. All applicable international, national and/or institutional guidelines for the care and use of animals were followed. This article does not contain any studies with human participants performed by any of the authors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CIBIO/InBIO, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos da Universidade do Porto, Campus Agrário de Vairão, 4485-661, Vairão, Portugal

    João Vasco Leite, Francisco Álvares, Guillermo Velo-Antón, José Carlos Brito & Raquel Godinho

  2. Departamento de Biologia, Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade do Porto, Rua do Campo Alegre FC4, 4169-007, Porto, Portugal

    José Carlos Brito & Raquel Godinho

  3. Department of Zoology, Faculty of Sciences, University of Johannesburg, 23, Auckland Park, 2006, South Africa

    Raquel Godinho

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  1. João Vasco Leite
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  2. Francisco Álvares
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  3. Guillermo Velo-Antón
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  4. José Carlos Brito
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  5. Raquel Godinho
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Correspondence to João Vasco Leite or Raquel Godinho.

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Leite, J.V., Álvares, F., Velo-Antón, G. et al. Differentiation of North African foxes and population genetic dynamics in the desert—insights into the evolutionary history of two sister taxa, Vulpes rueppellii and Vulpes vulpes . Org Divers Evol 15, 731–745 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13127-015-0232-8

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