On the origin of endemic stone charr in the Kamchatka River basin

Evidence for divergence between sympatric stone charr and Dolly Varden along unique environmental gradients in Kamchatka

“…Previous studies demonstrated that SC belongs to Beringian mtDNA D‐loop clade of charrs sensu Brunner et al (2001) including northern DV S. malma (Oleinik et al, 2013; Oleinik, Skurikhina, & Kukhlevsky, 2017; Yamamoto, Maekawa, Morita, Crane, & Oleinik, 2014). No less than 11 DV mtDNA haplotypes were found in the Kamchatka River using the method of restriction analysis (Oleinik, Skurikhina, Brykov, Crane, & Wenburg, 2005), and two of them were recognized for SC (Balakirev, Parensky, et al, 2016; Oleinik et al, 2019). We found one new SC D‐loop haplotype defined by a single mutation relative to nominal S. kuznetzovi from the Kamchatka River (KU674351).…”

“…To assemble the final set of D‐loop haplotypes for the polymorphism analysis, we comprised all accessible GenBank data for SC (KU674351) (Balakirev, Parensky, et al, 2016) (AF298018) (Brunner et al, 2001) (KY122308) (Oleinik et al, 2019). Moreover, 13 nucleotide sequences for S. malma were taken from the Beringian region and from Kamchatka River in particular (KJ746619, KJ746618, KJ746618 AF298020 JN868490, AB684820, AB684823, AB684829, AB684787, AB684809, AB20697, AB684793, AB684788).…”

“…One of the most diverse riverine charr faunas is known from the Kamchatka River basin (Oleinik, Skurikhina, & Brykov, 2015; Savvaitova, 1989). This river could be defined as an evolutionary cradle for northern Dolly Varden (DV) Salvelinus malma (Walbaum, 1792) in the Northen Pacific area (Oleinik, Skurikhina, Bondar, & Brykov, 2013; Oleinik, Skurikhina, Kukhlevsky, & Bondar, 2019) given the remarkable level of life history variation observed (Chereshnev, Volobuev, Shestakov, & Frolov, 2002). According to geological records, the basin has not been covered with ice for the last 200,000 years (Braiceva, Melekestcev, Evteeva, & Lipukina, 1968; Elias & Brigham‐Grette, 2013) and has acted as a refuge for a widely distributed “relic” coniferous forest zone (Dirksen, Dirksen, & Diekmann, 2013; Klimaschewski et al, 2015).…”

“…Later Glubokovsky (1995) considered it as melanistic form of Salvelinus albus Glubokovsky, 1977. Recently, some authors have given this endemic an independent species status, Salvelinus kuznetzovi Taranetz, 1933 ZIN 26,888 (Balakirev, Parensky, Kovalev, & Ayala, 2016), or subspecies of DV, S. malma kuznetzovi (Oleinik et al, 2019; Tokranov, 2004). Meanwhile, no data were presented for the reproductive relationship between SC and DV, and no definite solution has been found for SC taxonomy yet.…”

Assessing the impact of charr research past, present, and future

“…Three articles were included here in the proceedings. First, Oleinik et al (2019) Table 1 for locations and dates of each symposium) in the future. Third, Miller et al (2019) described how removal of non-native brown trout (Salmo trutta, Linnaeus 1758) led to increased abundance and size structure of a native brook charr population in a stream in Minnesota, north-central USA.…”