PARENT SESSION

Genetics/Evolution 1 -- Session Chair: Hopi Hoekstra-- University Center, Kate Buchanan Room

PHYLOGEOGRAPHY OF ERMINE (MUSTELA ERMINEA) AND MINK (MUSTELA VISON) OF THE ALEXANDER ARCHIPELAGO OF SOUTHEAST ALASKA. Natalie G. Dawson, Melissa A. Fleming and Joseph A. Cook. Museum of Southwestern Biology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM.

ABSTRACT- Southeast (SE) Alaska is a region of high mammalian endemism, due primarily to a complex glacial history and highly fragmented landscape. Four ermine and 1 mink subspecies are island endemics in the region and considered 'potentially threatened' by the IUCN. Greater diversity of ermine may be due to a more complex phylogeographic history and to lower levels of current gene flow among islands/mainland compared to mink (which are semiaquatic). To test these hypotheses, we compared mtDNA sequence diversity (cyt b and control region) and microsatellite diversity (at 14 loci) for mink and ermine from 4 mainland and 3 island locations. Ermine show greater differences in mitochondrial and microsatellite diversity among the islands and between the islands and mainland than mink reflecting both their recolonization of SE Alaska from multiple glacial refugia and lower vagility. Mink appear to have recolonized from a single refugium but, surprisingly, exhibit lower gene flow between coastal mainland locations than ermine. Differences in breeding biology and/or gene flow from interior BC along major rivers may account for lower than expected gene flow among some populations of mink.

KEY WORDS: Mustela erminea, phylogeography, Mustela vison