Dataset Information

The changing pace of insular life: 5000 years of microevolution in the Orkney vole (Microtus arvalis orcadensis).

ABSTRACT: Island evolution may be expected to involve fast initial morphological divergence followed by stasis. We tested this model using the dental phenotype of modern and ancient common voles (Microtus arvalis), introduced onto the Orkney archipelago (Scotland) from continental Europe some 5000 years ago. First, we investigated phenotypic divergence of Orkney and continental European populations and assessed climatic influences. Second, phenotypic differentiation among Orkney populations was tested against geography, time, and neutral genetic patterns. Finally, we examined evolutionary change along a time series for the Orkney Mainland. Molar gigantism and anterior-lobe hypertrophy evolved rapidly in Orkney voles following introduction, without any transitional forms detected. Founder events and adaptation appear to explain this initial rapid evolution. Idiosyncrasy in dental features among different island populations of Orkney voles is also likely the result of local founder events following Neolithic translocation around the archipelago. However, against our initial expectations, a second marked phenotypic shift occurred between the 4th and 12th centuries AD, associated with increased pastoral farming and introduction of competitors (mice and rats) and terrestrial predators (foxes and cats). These results indicate that human agency can generate a more complex pattern of morphological evolution than might be expected in island rodents.

SUBMITTER: Cucchi T

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5366975 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

The changing pace of insular life: 5000 years of microevolution in the Orkney vole (Microtus arvalis orcadensis).

Cucchi Thomas T Barnett Ross R Martínková Natália N Renaud Sabrina S Renvoisé Elodie E Evin Allowen A Sheridan Alison A Mainland Ingrid I Wickham-Jones Caroline C Tougard Christelle C Quéré Jean Pierre JP Pascal Michel M Pascal Marine M Heckel Gerald G O'Higgins Paul P Searle Jeremy B JB Dobney Keith M KM

Evolution; international journal of organic evolution 20140729 10

Island evolution may be expected to involve fast initial morphological divergence followed by stasis. We tested this model using the dental phenotype of modern and ancient common voles (Microtus arvalis), introduced onto the Orkney archipelago (Scotland) from continental Europe some 5000 years ago. First, we investigated phenotypic divergence of Orkney and continental European populations and assessed climatic influences. Second, phenotypic differentiation among Orkney populations was tested aga ...[more]

PMID: 24957579

Similar Datasets

Project description:Common voles are a main European facultative, fossorial, farmland rodent pest that can greatly reduce crop yields during population outbreaks. Crop protection against common voles is a complex task that requires the consideration of a set of preventive and control measures within an integrated pest management strategy. A possible option could be to modify farming practices to reduce the availability of refuges for rodents and the damage to crops that they subsequently cause. Farming, however, must simultaneously meet multiple goals including the reduction of the carbon (C) emissions, soil erosion and water use, and the improvement of soil quality. Crop establishment through conservation agriculture strategies, like zero-tillage, would reduce crop management investment, but is also promoted in many regions to reduce C emissions and increase soil organic matter. It could, however, create favourable refuge habitats for fossorial rodent crop pests, like common voles, benefitting from reduced soil disturbance between crop rotations and thus increasing burrow persistence. Assessing the impact that tillage practices, their interaction with different crops and the influence of proximity to potential common vole sources, have on common vole occupancy could provide a valuable tool within an integrated management strategy. Using a 2-ha experimental field with 62 plots 180?m2 (each roughly matching common vole home range size) located experimental plots in north-western Spain, we tested how tillage practices, crop type (wheat, barley, vetch, Narbonne vetch, pea and fallow) and distances from possible colonization sources affect field use by common vole during low population density conditions. Our results show that tillage practices have more influence on common vole occurrence (zero tillage?>?reduced and conventional tillage) than other aspects such as crop type thus supporting the hypothesis that tillage practices play a key role in common vole habitat use.

Dataset Information

The changing pace of insular life: 5000 years of microevolution in the Orkney vole (Microtus arvalis orcadensis).

Publications

The changing pace of insular life: 5000 years of microevolution in the Orkney vole (Microtus arvalis orcadensis).

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets