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Haddeland PJ, Junge C, Serbezov D, Vøllestad LA. Genetic parentage analysis confirms a polygynandrous breeding system in the European grayling (Thymallus thymallus). PLoS One 2015; 10:e0122032. [PMID: 25793629 PMCID: PMC4368113 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0122032] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/02/2014] [Accepted: 02/09/2015] [Indexed: 11/26/2022] Open
Abstract
Knowing the breeding system of a species is important in order to understand individual variation in reproductive success. Large variation in reproductive success and thus reproductive skew strongly impacts on the effective number of breeders and thus the long-term effective population size (Ne). Fishes, in particular species belonging to the salmonid family, exhibit a wide diversity of breeding systems. In general, however, breeding systems are rarely studied in detail in the wild. Here we examine the breeding system of the spring-spawning European grayling Thymallus thymallus from a small Norwegian stream using parentage assignment based on the genotyping of 19 polymorphic microsatellite loci. In total 895 individual grayling fry and 154 mature grayling (57 females and 97 males) were genotyped. A total of 466 offspring were assigned a father, a mother, or a parent pair with a confidence of 90% or higher. Successfully reproducing males had on average 11.9 ± 13.3 (SD) offspring with on average 2.1 ± 1.2 partners, whereas successful females had on average 9.5 ± 12.8 offspring and 2.3 ± 1.5 partners. Parents with more partners also produced more offspring. Thus the grayling breeding system within this small stream revealed a polygynandrous breeding system, similar to what has been observed for many other salmonid fish species. The present study thus unambiguously corroborates a polygynadrous breeding system in the European grayling. This knowledge is critical for managing populations of this species, which has suffered significant local population declines throughout its range over the last several decades.
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Affiliation(s)
- Peter Jørgen Haddeland
- Center for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, P. O. Box 1066, Blindern, 0316, Oslo, Norway
- Department of Genetic Kinship and Identity, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, P. O. Box 4040, Nydalen, 0403, Oslo, Norway
| | - Claudia Junge
- Center for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, P. O. Box 1066, Blindern, 0316, Oslo, Norway
- Southern Seas Ecology Laboratories, DP418, School of Biological Sciences, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia
| | - Dimitar Serbezov
- Center for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, P. O. Box 1066, Blindern, 0316, Oslo, Norway
- National Agency of Fisheries and Aquaculture, 17 Hristo Botev Blvd, 1606, Sofia, Bulgaria
| | - Leif Asbjørn Vøllestad
- Center for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, P. O. Box 1066, Blindern, 0316, Oslo, Norway
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