Data from: Social organisation and genetic structure: insights from co-distributed bat populations

The impact of ecology and social organisation on genetic structure at landscape spatial scales, where gene dynamics shape evolution as well as determine susceptibility to habitat fragmentation, is poorly understood. Attempts to assess these effects must take into account the potentially confounding effects of history. We used microsatellites to compare genetic structure in seven bat species with contrasting patterns of roosting ecology and social organisation, all of which are co-distributed in an ancient forest habitat that has been exceptionally buffered from radical habitat shifts. Over one thousand individuals were captured at foraging sites and genotyped at polymorphic microsatellite loci. Analyses of spatially explicit genotype data revealed inter-species differences in the extent of movement and gene flow and genetic structure across continuous intact forest. Highest positive genetic structure was observed in tree-roosting taxa that roost either alone or in small groups. By comparison, a complete absence of genetic autocorrelation was noted in the cave-roosting colonial species across the study area. Our results thus reveal measurable inter-species differences in the natural limits of gene flow in an unmodified habitat, which we attribute to contrasting roosting ecology and social organisation. The consequences of ecology and behaviour for gene flow have important implications for conservation. In particular, tree-roosting species characterised by lower vagility and thus gene flow will be disproportionally impacted by landscape-scale forest clearance and habitat fragmentation, which are prevalent in the study region. Our method also highlights the usefulness of rapid sampling of foraging bats for assaying genetic structure, particularly where roosting sites are not always known.

在景观空间尺度下，生态与社会组织对遗传结构的影响尚未得到充分阐明——而基因动态不仅塑造演化进程，同时也决定了物种对生境破碎化的易感程度。若要评估此类影响，必须将历史演化带来的潜在混杂效应纳入考量范畴。本研究利用微卫星标记（microsatellite），对7种栖息生态与社会组织模式存在显著差异的蝙蝠物种的遗传结构进行比较分析；所有研究物种均同域分布于一处古老森林生境中，该生境极少受到剧烈生境变化的干扰。研究人员在觅食位点捕获了逾千只蝙蝠个体，并对其多态性微卫星位点进行基因分型。对空间显性基因型数据（spatially explicit genotype data）的分析结果显示，在连续完整的森林生境中，不同蝙蝠物种的活动范围、基因流水平及遗传结构均存在显著差异。单独或小群体栖息的树栖类群呈现出最高的正向遗传结构；相较之下，群居洞栖的蝙蝠物种在整个研究区域内完全未出现遗传自相关（genetic autocorrelation）现象。因此，本研究结果揭示了未受干扰生境中基因流自然上限的种间差异，而此类差异可归因于不同物种间栖息生态与社会组织模式的显著差异。生态与行为特征对基因流的影响，对物种保护工作具有重要意义。具体而言，扩散能力较弱、因此基因流水平偏低的树栖物种，将受到研究区域内普遍存在的景观尺度森林砍伐与生境破碎化的不成比例的严重影响。本研究方法同时表明，通过对觅食蝙蝠进行快速采样以评估其遗传结构是切实可行的，尤其适用于栖息位点难以确定的研究场景。