Altitudinal distribution and outdoor occurrence in chromosomal races of the house mouse (Mus musculus domesticus) in central Italy

Title:

Altitudinal distribution and outdoor occurrence in chromosomal races of the house mouse (Mus musculus domesticus) in central Italy

Creator:

Castiglia, Riccardo and Caporioni, Marco

Identifier:

https://cdk.lib.cas.cz/client/handle/uuid:829beacf-a637-8f56-b85f-bcc5974c65e6
uuid:829beacf-a637-8f56-b85f-bcc5974c65e6

Subject:

barn owl, evolutionary history, house mouse, Robertsonian race, chromosomal speciation, and Tyto alba

Type:

article and TEXT

Description:

We reviewed the distribution of Robertsonian (Rb) races of Mus musculus domesticus in central and southern Italy. This Rb system is called the Apennine system and includes four races (Cittaducale, ICDE, 2n=22; Ancarano, IACR, 2n=24; Campobasso, ICBO, 2n=22; Colfiorito, ICOL, 2n=33–34) surrounded by standard populations with karyotype 2n=40. Here we evaluate the relationships between the altitudinal distribution of races, and the indoor vs. outdoor behaviour of populations, inferred from literature data on the diet of the barn owl Tyto alba. We assume that a higher prevalence of mice in owl pellets reflects a higher outdoor occurrence of mice. The IACR and ICDE races were found at higher altitudes than the standard populations, while the ICBO race is present at lower altitudes like the standard race. The standard race has indoor and outdoor populations; in all the Rb races an indoor life has been suggested by our data. This behaviour is only partly due to altitude, since the ICBO race also lives at sea level. We speculated that indoor life is an intrinsic characteristic of the ICBO race irrespective of the environment. This pattern reinforces the idea that indoor life, through its population dynamics, has played a significant role in the evolutionary history of Rb races.

Language:

English

Rights:

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

Source:

Folia zoologica | 2005 Volume:54 | Number:3

Harvested from:

CDK

Metadata only:

false