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Heterozygosity is low where rare color variants in wild carnivores prevail

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Tensen, Laura, Fischer, Klaus·2024·Ecology and Evolution
DOI 10.1002/ece3.10881PMC PMC10847885
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Abstract

Coat color and pattern are a distinguished feature in mammalian carnivores, shaped by climatic cycles and habitat type. It can be expressed in various ways, such as gradients, polymorphisms, and rare color variants. Although natural selection explains much of the phenotypic variation found in the wild, genetic drift and heterozygote deficiency, as prominent in small and fragmented populations, may also affect phenotypic variability through the fixation of recessive alleles. The aim of this study was to test whether rare color variants in the wild could relate to a deficiency of heterozygotes, resulting from habitat fragmentation and small population size. We present an overview of all rare color variants in the order Carnivora, and compiled demographic and genetic data of the populations where they did and did not occur, to test for significant correlations. We also tested how phylogeny and body weight influenced the presence of color variants with phylogenetic generalized linear mixed models (PGLMMs). We found 40 color‐variable species and 59 rare color variants. In 17 variable phenotypic populations for which genetic diversity was available, the average AR was 4.18, HO = 0.59, and HE = 0.66, and FIS = 0.086. We found that variable populations displayed a significant reduction in heterozygosity and allelic richness compared to non‐variable populations across species. We also found a significant negative correlation between population size and inbreeding coefficients. Therefore, it is possible that small effective size had phenotypic consequences on the extant populations. The high frequency of the rare color variants (averaging 20%) also implies that genetic drift is locally overruling natural selection in small effective populations. As such, rare color variants could be added to the list of phenotypic consequences of inbreeding in the wild.

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  • Whilst tiger colour morphs do appear in the wild, this occurrence is typically due to genetic drift and habitat fragmentation rather than beneficial evolutionary traits.

    “Whilst tiger colour morphs do appear in the wild, this occurrence is typically due to genetic drift and habitat fragmentation rather than beneficial evolutionary traits [70].”

    From Tiger colour morphs in zoos raise conservation and welfare concerns (2026) · cites this paper as [70]

    The Introduction identifies black tigers as an example in which genetic drift may increase rare color variants, and the Discussion describes frequent pseudomelanism in an isolated tiger population with low heterozygosity. But the paper does not establish that tiger color morphs are typically caused by habitat fragmentation rather than beneficial traits; its Discussion says fragmentation did not appear to influence the presence of rare color variants in its dataset. (LLM, conf=0.85)

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Authors
Tensen, L., & Fischer, K.
Affiliations
  • University of Johannesburg (ZA)
  • Universität Koblenz (DE)
Corresponding author
Tensen, Laura
ORCID
Venue
Ecology and Evolution
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2024-02
Volume
14
Issue
2
Pages
e10881-e10881
ISSN
2045-7758 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1002/ece3.10881
PMC
PMC10847885
OpenAlex
W4391606092
Cited by
10
References
2
Citations by year
2026: 4 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 5
FWCI
2.64
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Ecology and Evolution (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic diversity and population structure
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic and phenotypic traits in livestock
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics › Animal Behavior and Reproduction
Keywords
coat color polymorphism, heterozygosity, inbreeding, genetic drift, Carnivora, wild carnivores, habitat fragmentation, population size, effective population size, allelic richness, inbreeding coefficient, phenotypic variability, phylogeny, body weight

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