Genetic structure and effective population sizes in European red deer (Cervus elaphus) at a continental scale: insights from microsatellite DNA

We analysed more than 600 red deer (Cervus elaphus) from large parts of its European distribution range at 13 microsatellite loci, presenting the first continent-wide study of this species using nuclear markers. Populations were clearly differentiated (overall FST = 0.166, Jost’s Dest = 0.385), and the BAPS clustering algorithm yielded mainly geographically limited and adjacent genetic units. When forced into only three genetic clusters our data set produced a very similar geographic pattern as previously found in mtDNA phylogeographic studies: a western group from Iberia to central and parts of Eastern Europe, an eastern group from the Balkans to Eastern Europe and a third group including the threatened relict populations from Sardinia and Mesola in Italy. This result was also confirmed by a multivariate approach to analysing our data set, a discriminant analysis of principal components (DAPC). Calculations of genetic diversity and effective population sizes (linkage-disequilibrium app...