Population structure of Athene cunicularia (Strigiformes: Strigidae) in anthropized areas in the state of São Paulo, Brazil

Resumo

Abstract Anthropogenic processes commonly interfere in the way communities of local species establish themselves in the environment, especially the urbanization process. Some species, such as the burrowing owl Athene cunicularia (Strigiformes: Strigidae), have characteristics that allow them to occupy urban areas successfully. However, this capacity of occupation does not mean that urbanization cannot negatively affect them. Given that genetic variability is extremely important for maintaining adaptive capacity to environmental changes, investigating the level of structuring and genetic diversity within populations has proven to be an excellent tool for understanding the adaptive responses of species. Thus, the genetic structure and diversity of three populations of burrowing owls in anthropized São Paulo, Brazil, were investigated using seven species-specific microsatellite markers. It is important to emphasize that there have been no studies on A. cunicularia in Brazil from a genetic point of view. The results of the genotypic analysis of genetic diversity, together with information about the distribution of this diversity, indicate that the populations of A. cunicularia analyzed have considerable genetic differentiation and that this is positively related to the geographic distance of individuals. This genetic differentiation is due to the presence of rare and exclusive alleles in populations, a result of the isolation process by distance caused by the reduction in gene flow, which seems to occur due to the selection of habitats and the nesting behavior of the species. The excess of homozygotes observed in these populations that led to deviation from Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium is characteristic of the Wahlund effect, and analyses identified an ancestry composed of six genetic units in the evolutionary history of A. cunicularia, which is still present across the three sampled localities.