Cryptic diversity of Italian bats and the role of the Apennine refugium in the phylogeography of the western Palaearctic

Abstract

The Mediterranean Basin is typified by a high degree of species rarity and endemicity that reflects its position, geomorphology, and history. Although the composition and cryptic variation of the bat faunas from the Iberian and Balkan Peninsulas are relatively well studied, data from the Apennine Peninsula are still incomplete. This is a significant shortfall, given the presumed refugial role of this region in the context of Europe's Pleistocene phylogeography. It was thus our aim to supplement the phylogeographical information from the region, generating mitochondrial sequences and reviewing published data, with a focus on the dispersal and diversification patterns characterizing taxa with different life strategies. Site‐specific lineages were ascertained, especially in the genera Myotis and Plecotus and amongst the pipistrelloid bats, representing speciose radiations. It was possible to observe disjunct ranges with patches isolated south of the Alps in several species, corresponding with evolution of elevated genetic distance. The genetic subdivision within the continuous Italian range into northern and southern lineages in several taxa indicated the possible past substructure of the refugium. Several shared lineages between the Apennine and Ibero‐Maghrebian regions were observed, indicating connectivity between the Adriatic and Atlantic−Mediterranean refuges, and raising questions as to which region these clades originated from and what was the direction of faunal exchange between them. In contrast to Europe's other two main refugia, the Apennine Peninsula is a smaller region with simpler phylogeographical patterns. Nevertheless, our results support the idea that the region generated novel lineages. Whereas diversification in sedentary bats may have been driven through the generation of in situ adaptations, specialization, and niche differentiation, the emergence of species with a tramp strategy could have entailed the utilization of faunal drift and the taxon cycle. © 2015 The Linnean Society of London

First record of Myotis alcathoe von Helversen & Heller, 2001 (Chiroptera: Vespertilionidae) in Macedonia

“…In fact, the topology is structured in two wellsupported groups, one made up of samples corresponding to the south of the Balkan Peninsula and Anatolia and another group which includes samples from Central and Western Europe. This grouping could be also identified in a tree shown as supplementary material in a previous study on the species (Bogdanowicz et al 2015), although the fact was not commented in that study; according to our sequences, the groups show a 1,4% K2P distance between them and point to two possible glacial refugia in the recent evolutionary history of the species, one of them in the Balkans. The new M. alcathoe from Macedonia clusters within the first group together with samples from Greece and Anatolia with which it shares haplotype.…”

Lifting the curtain on the freshwater mussel diversity of the Italian Peninsula and Croatian Adriatic coast

“…Araujo et al 2005Araujo et al , 2009Froufe et al 2014Froufe et al , 2016a, recent studies have evidenced patterns of population genetic differentiation that could also be explained by the occurrence of this scenario in Italy (e.g. ; Giovannotti et al 2010;Bogdanowicz et al 2015;Mezzasalma et al 2015). In this context, we aim to provide information for the conservation of freshwater mussels in the Italian Peninsula and Croatian Adriatic coast.…”

Evolutionary history of the European free‐tailed bat, a tropical affinity species spanning across the Mediterranean Basin

“…Among bats, Italy has been identified as a glacial refugium for Myotis myotis (Ruedi et al, ) and a possible refugium for Rhinolophus ferrumequinum (Rossiter et al, ). In a recent paper, Bogdanowicz et al () suggested that this pattern might be widespread among bat species. Focusing on Miniopterus schreibersii , Bilgin et al () suggested a new paradigm of European colonization from Anatolian populations, and although we identified an ancient population in Anatolia/Middle East, our results do not support the hypothesis of a European recolonization from this region, a similar pattern to R. ferrumequinum (Rossiter et al, ).…”