The formation of avian montane diversity across barriers and along elevational gradients

Pujolar, J. M.; Blom, Mozes P. K.; Reeve, Andrew Hart; Kennedy, Jonathan D.; Marki, Petter Z.; Korneliussen, Thorfinn Sand; Freeman, Benjamin G.; Sam, Kateřina; Linck, Ethan; Haryoko, Tri; Iova, Bulisa; Koane, Bonny; Maiah, Gibson; Paul, Luda; Irestedt, Martin; Jønsson, Knud A.

doi:10.1038/s41467-021-27858-5

Cited by 29 publications

(30 citation statements)

References 56 publications

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“…A similar rise-and-fall N e dynamic is seen in T. celaenops , which colonized isolated Japanese islands (Fig. 4a), and in snowy-browed flycatcher ( Ficedula hyperythra ) (Pujolar et al 2022), another passerine supercolonizer of island mountains with likely origins on the Asian mainland (Moyle et al 2015). This pattern suggests that mainland population build-up can trigger archipelagic radiations.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 54%

Population genomics of the island thrush elucidates one of earth’s great archipelagic radiations

Reeve¹,

Gower

Pujolar³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Tropical islands are renowned as natural laboratories for evolutionary study. Lineage radiations across tropical archipelagos are ideal systems for investigating how colonization, speciation, and extinction processes shape biodiversity patterns. The expansion of the island thrush across the Indo-Pacific represents one of the largest yet most perplexing island radiations of any songbird species. The island thrush exhibits a complex mosaic of pronounced plumage variation across its range, and is arguably the world’s most polytypic bird. It is a sedentary species largely restricted to mountain forests, yet it has colonized a vast island region spanning a quarter of the globe. We conducted comprehensive sampling of island thrush populations and obtained genome-wide SNP data, which we used to reconstruct its phylogeny, population structure, gene flow, and demographic history. The island thrush evolved from migratory Palearctic ancestors and radiated explosively across the Indo-Pacific during the Pleistocene, with numerous instances of gene flow between populations. Its bewildering plumage variation masks a biogeographically intuitive stepping stone colonization path from the Philippines through the Greater Sundas, Wallacea and New Guinea to Polynesia. The island thrush’s success in colonizing Indo-Pacific mountains can be understood in light of its ancestral mobility and adaptation to cool climates; however, shifts in elevational range, degree of plumage variation and apparent dispersal rates in the eastern part of its range raise further intriguing questions about its biology.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 54%

Population genomics of the island thrush elucidates one of earth’s great archipelagic radiations

Reeve¹,

Gower

Pujolar³

et al. 2022

Preprint

Self Cite

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“…Populations in the H. leucophrys complex occurring at high elevations in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta (Caro et al, 2013) and the Andes of Ecuador (Dingle et al, 2008(Dingle et al, , 2010 Marta and the Andes, regional differences in factors other than, or in addition to temperature, have led to an absence of convergent evolution in feathers; or (3) populations from different regions may have responded to the challenges of high elevations in different ways (e.g., more insulative plumage vs. greater thermogenic capacity). Alternatively, we speculate that in mountains where a single species exists across a large elevational gradient, high gene flow along mountain slopes (as shown in Linck et al, 2020and Pujolar et al, 2022, but see Polato et al, 2018 may restrict the emergence of adaptive variation in the highlands owing to swamping of locally beneficial alleles by maladaptive variants arriving via dispersal from lower elevations (Bachmann et al, 2020;Bridle et al, 2009;Bridle & Vines, 2007;Polechová & Barton, 2015). In…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 86%

Variation in insulative feather structure in songbirds replacing each other along a tropical elevation gradient

Barve

Cadena

2022

Ecology and Evolution

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High‐elevation organisms are expected to evolve physiological adaptations to cope with harsh environmental conditions. Yet, evidence for such adaptive differences, especially compared to closely related lowland taxa occurring along the same elevational gradient, is rare. Revisiting an anecdotal natural history observation by O. Bangs from 1899 and based on new measurements of museum specimens, we confirmed that the high‐elevation hermit wood wren (Henicorhina anachoreta) from the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia, has longer, more insulative feathers on the chest and back, than its lower‐elevation counterpart the grey‐breasted wood wren (H. leucophrys). However, we did not find evidence for the same specializations in subspecies of H. leucophrys that live at high elevations on other elevational gradients in the Colombian Andes, although similar adaptive solutions have arisen in separate mountain systems like the Himalayas. Adaptations in plumage may be associated with the recurrence of elevational species replacements throughout the tropics.

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“…Both Eurasia and Australo-Papua have substantial montane avifaunas distributed across broad elevational gradients. Australo-Papuan montane species can colonize the disjunct mountain ranges of New Guinea (Diamond, 1972; Pujolar et al, 2022), but they are extremely poor at crossing deep water barriers. The different colonization processes of Eurasian-origin versus Australo-Papuan-origin birds appears to be rooted in the temperate/tropical dichotomy in our study system, aligning with previous observations that lineages from regions with cold and seasonal climates are adept at colonizing disjunct mountain ranges (Lobo & Halffter, 2000; Donoghue, 2008; Merckx et al, 2015).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The formation of the Indo-Pacific montane avifauna

Reeve¹,

Kennedy²,

Pujolar³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Mountain biotas have considerable conservation and research importance, but the formation of montane communities remains incompletely understood. Study of Indo-Pacific island faunas has inspired two main hypotheses for the generation of montane diversity. The first posits that montane populations arise via direct colonization from other mountain areas, while the second invokes recruitment from adjacent lowland populations. We sought to reconcile these apparently conflicting hypotheses by asking whether a species' ancestral geographic origin determines its mode of mountain colonization. To this end, island-dwelling passerine birds at the faunal crossroads between Eurasia and Australo-Papua provide an ideal study system. We recovered the phylogenetic relationships of the region's montane species, and used this information to reconstruct their ancestral geographic ranges, elevational ranges, and migratory behavior. We also performed genomic population studies of three super-dispersive montane species/clades with broad island distributions. Eurasian-origin species populated archipelagos via direct colonization between mountains. This mode of colonization appears related to ancestral adaptations to cold and seasonal Palearctic climates, specifically short-distance migration. Australo-Papuan-origin mountain populations, by contrast, evolved from lowland ancestors, and highland distribution mostly precludes their further colonization of island mountains. The patterns and processes revealed for this group are compatible with taxon cycles, a hypothesized process of lowland lineage expansion followed by montane relictualization. Collectively, our analyses explain much of the distributional variation within a complex biological system, and provide a synthesis of two seemingly discordant hypotheses for montane community formation.

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The formation of avian montane diversity across barriers and along elevational gradients

Cited by 29 publications

References 56 publications

Population genomics of the island thrush elucidates one of earth’s great archipelagic radiations

Population genomics of the island thrush elucidates one of earth’s great archipelagic radiations

Variation in insulative feather structure in songbirds replacing each other along a tropical elevation gradient

The formation of the Indo-Pacific montane avifauna

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