Effective size of two feral domestic cat populations (Felis catusL.): effect of the mating system

Abstract

A variety of behavioural traits have substantial effects on the gene dynamics and genetic structure of local populations. The mating system is a plastic trait that varies with environmental conditions in the domestic cat (Felis catus) allowing an intraspecific comparison of the impact of this feature on genetic characteristics of the population. To assess the potential effect of the heterogenity of males' contribution to the next generation on variance effective size, we applied the ecological approach of Nunney& Elam (1994) based upon a demographic and behavioural study, and the genetic 'temporal methods' of Waples (1989) and Berthier et al. (2002) using microsatellite markers. The two cat populations studied were nearly closed, similar in size and survival parameters, but differed in their mating system. Immigration appeared extremely restricted in both cases due to environmental and social constraints. As expected, the ratio of effective size to census number (Ne/N) was higher in the promiscuous cat population (harmonic mean = 42%) than in the polygynous one (33%), when Ne was calculated from the ecological method. Only the genetic results based on Waples' estimator were consistent with the ecological results, but failed to evidence an effect of the mating system. Results based on the estimation of Berthier et al. (2002) were extremely variable, with Ne sometimes exceeding census size. Such low reliability in the genetic results should retain attention for conservation purposes.

Survival of Feral Cats,Felis catus(Carnivora: Felidae), on Mauna Kea, Hawai'i, Based on Tooth Cementum Lines

“…Reported longevity was high on Marion Island (8-9 yr [van Aarde 1984]) and the Kerguelen Islands (8 yr [Pascal 1980]). Our survival estimate from the Mauna Kea wilderness was more similar to those from feral cats living in anthropogenic environments (0.57-0.88 [Kaeuffer et al 2004, Schmidt et al 2007) versus those from the remote oceanic islands given earlier. Kaeuffer et al (2004) calculated longevity of male cats in France to be 2.85 yr in an urban setting and 2.63 yr for a rural town, and females were 3.70 yr and 4.35 yr, respectively.…”

“…Our survival estimate from the Mauna Kea wilderness was more similar to those from feral cats living in anthropogenic environments (0.57-0.88 [Kaeuffer et al 2004, Schmidt et al 2007) versus those from the remote oceanic islands given earlier. Kaeuffer et al (2004) calculated longevity of male cats in France to be 2.85 yr in an urban setting and 2.63 yr for a rural town, and females were 3.70 yr and 4.35 yr, respectively. However, Warner (1985) reported low longevity in farm cats in Illinois, U.S.A., where less than 3% lived b4 yr, and only 1% lived b7 yr, apparently from mortality by humans and dogs.…”

Using population genetic tools to develop a control strategy for feral cats (Felis catus) in Hawai'i

“…Kaeuffer et al (2004) estimated that the mean generation time for feral cats in France was 3.38 years. This suggests that >10 cats migrated between WMK and NMK and successfully reproduced in 3 years.…”

Comparison of carnivore, omnivore, and herbivore mammalian genomes with a new leopard assembly

“…Bootstrapping was performed to determine the estimation accuracy by randomly resampling 100 sequences from the original sequences. The final results were plotted using a “psmc_plot.pl” script in PSMC utils with previously reported generation times (-g: three years for leopard cat, five years for big cats) and mutation rates (-u [per site, per year]: 1.1*e-9) [16, 84]. …”