Newswise — While European settlers were spreading across North America, the coyote, originally a creature of the American Midwest, was also expanding its territory. Changes in North American ecosystems have helped the coyote spread west to the Pacific, east to the Atlantic, north to Alaska, and south all the way to Panama. Following the coyote’s eastward expansion route, researchers have found evidence of hybridization with the endangered red wolf, and now, the Great Lakes wolf, which according to some biologists is a distinct species.
The current issue of the Journal of Mammalogy reports on coyotes’ colonization of northern Virginia. Researchers used molecular techniques to detect the geographic origin of the animals in this expansion of coyote territory, which has occurred over the past several decades.
While coyotes have been expanding, wolf populations have become endangered. The number of gray wolves in North America has declined from approximately 2 million before colonization to about 70,000 currently. Hybridization with coyotes is now a principal threat to the recovery of wolves.
The coyotes in this study followed both northern and southern routes as they moved eastward, converging in the mid-Atlantic region. Scat (fecal) samples were collected from two locations in northern Virginia, analyzed, and compared to results of previous genetic studies of coyotes in other regions.
Through scat analysis, DNA haplotypes (groups of alleles of closely linked genes on a chromosome) were assigned to coyotes. Seven haplotypes were detected; all had also been observed in populations in other regions. This genetic diversity indicates that the colonization in Virginia came from multiple geographic locations to the north, south, and west, consistent with this being the endpoint of U.S. continental expansion by the coyote.
One common haplotype found in the Virginia colony is of wolf origin, indicating the presence of admixed coyotes and Great Lakes wolves. Animals with this haplotype not only show mixed genetic signatures but also possess craniodental characteristics more similar to wolves than coyotes, which demonstrates the ecological significance of this hybridization.
These admixed coyotes have also been found further south, into North Carolina. This expansion brings the hybridized coyote into the range of the red wolf, a critically endangered species, and potentially complicates an ongoing red wolf reintroduction program.
Full text of “Coyote Colonization of Northern Virginia and Admixture with Great Lakes Wolves,” and other articles in this special section of the Journal of Mammalogy, Vol. 92, No. 5, October 2011, are available at: http://www.asmjournals.org/toc/mamm/92/5###
About the Journal of MammalogyThe Journal of Mammalogy, the flagship publication of the American Society of Mammalogists, is produced six times per year. A highly respected scientific journal, it details the latest research in the science of mammalogy and was recently named one of the top 100 most influential journals of biology and medicine in the last century by the Special Libraries Association. For more information, visit http://www.mammalogy.org/.
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