Conservation Genetic Analysis of the Texas State Bison Herd

Abstract

The Texas State Bison Herd is directly descended from the herd assembled from 5 wild-caught bison by Charles Goodnight in the 1880s. In 1997, 36 bison were used to establish a herd at Caprock Canyons State Park. To aid in the development of a long-term genetic conservation plan for this population, we examined and analyzed allelic variation at 54 microsatellite loci representing each of the nuclear chromosomes in the bison genome. The current Texas State Bison Herd population exhibits low genetic diversity and heterozygosity levels compared with bison at Yellowstone National Park and Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Parentage analysis indicates that relatively few adults have contributed offspring in the last 5 years, leading to low effective population size estimations and a rapid increase in the average age of animals in the herd. The very limited number of original founders, multiple population bottlenecks over the last 120 years, and chronically small population size, coupled with genetic drift and inbreeding, have resulted in dangerously low levels of genetic diversity. This, in turn, has likely triggered demographic problems such as low recruitment and high calf mortality rates. Population viability analysis based on current population demography reveals that there is a 99% chance of extinction of the herd within the next 41 years. Based on these findings, the continued existence of this historically important bison population appears doubtful without the introduction of new genetic variation from another plains bison herd.

Foot mucus stored on FTA® cards is a reliable and non-invasive source of DNA for genetics studies in molluscs

“…The integument of gastropods produces significant amounts of mucus and proteineous fluid for their locomotion and protection against predators (Luchtel and Deyrup-Olson 2001). We used this property of terrestrial molluscs to sample mucus using FTA cards (patented by Whatman), a commercially available product already tested on several species in various taxonomic groups (Halbert et al 2004;Johanson et al 2009;Signorovitch et al 2005). This sampling system proves to be of limited disturbance for the specimens, very handy and fast in the field because the sampling process is simple and does not require any additional chemical products.…”

Polymorphism and Haplotype Structure in River Buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) Toll-Like Receptor 5 (TLR5) Coding Sequence

“…Buffalo DNA generated from whole blood was extracted via the phenol-chloroform method (6). DNA from bison was extracted from hair as previously described (7) and cattle DNA was extracted from semen straws (8).…”

Marker Genotypes and Population Admixture and Their Association With Body Weight, Height and Relative Body Mass in United States Federal Bison Herds

“…Although bison and domestic cattle are classified into different genera (Bison and Bos) and are estimated to have diverged 1.0-1.5 million years ago (Hartl et al 1988;Wall et al 1992;Ritz et al 2000), they still have the same number of chromosomes (m ¼ 30), the same chromosome banding patterns (Basrur and Moon 1967;Ying and Peden 1977), and a highly similar autosomal gene content and order (Schnabel et al 2003). Interbreeding between bison and domestic cattle can result in fertile offspring, and modern technologies have been used to detect domestic cattle genetic introgression in many extant bison populations (Polziehn et al 1995;Ward et al 1999;Ward 2000;Halbert et al 2005).Although the recently enriched bovine linkage map (Ihara et al 2004) has become a critical resource in the dissection of bovine quantitative traits including those of bison, only a few studies have reported microsatellite variation in North American bison (Momens et al 1998;Wilson and Strobeck 1999;Ward 2000;Halbert 2003;Schnabel et al 2003;Halbert et al 2004). Moreover, only one QTL genome scan has so far been reported in bison (Schnabel et al 2003); these investigators used a linkage map of 292 microsatellite markers spanning all 29 autosomes.…”

“…Bison sampled from the FN herd included only calves from the 2002 roundup, from which height data are not available. DNA extraction from hair and whole blood samples, multiplex polymerase chain reaction design, and microsatellite analyses were performed as previously described (Halbert 2003;Halbert et al 2004). Sixty microsatellite marker loci distributed throughout the bison genome were scored for each sample.…”

“…Although the recently enriched bovine linkage map (Ihara et al 2004) has become a critical resource in the dissection of bovine quantitative traits including those of bison, only a few studies have reported microsatellite variation in North American bison (Momens et al 1998;Wilson and Strobeck 1999;Ward 2000;Halbert 2003;Schnabel et al 2003;Halbert et al 2004). Moreover, only one QTL genome scan has so far been reported in bison (Schnabel et al 2003); these investigators used a linkage map of 292 microsatellite markers spanning all 29 autosomes.…”