Population signatures of large-scale, long-term disjunction and small-scale, short-term habitat fragmentation in an Afromontane forest bird.

ABSTRACT: The Eastern Afromontane cloud forests occur as geographically distinct mountain exclaves. The conditions of these forests range from large to small and from fairly intact to strongly degraded. For this study, we sampled individuals of the forest bird species, the Montane White-eye Zosterops poliogaster from 16 sites and four mountain archipelagos. We analysed 12 polymorphic microsatellites and three phenotypic traits, and calculated Species Distribution Models (SDMs) to project past distributions and predict potential future range shifts under a scenario of climate warming. We found well-supported genetic and morphologic clusters corresponding to the mountain ranges where populations were sampled, with 43% of all alleles being restricted to single mountains. Our data suggest that large-sca

SUBMITTER: Habel JC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4815645 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature