We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
Heterozygosity, inbreeding and neonatal traits in Soay sheep on St Kilda.
- Authors
Overall, A. D. J.; Byrne, K. A.; Pilkington, J. G.; Pemberton, J. M.
- Abstract
We investigated whether birth weight and neonatal survival, a period within which 24% of all mortalities occur, were correlated with levels of inbreeding in St Kilda Soay sheep, using pedigree inbreeding coefficients and four marker-based estimators of inbreeding. None of the inbreeding estimators, either of the offspring, or of their mothers, explained significant variation in a lamb's birth weight or probability of surviving the neonatal period, suggesting low inbreeding depression for these traits. We evaluated the correlation between the marker-based measures of inbreeding and inbreeding coefficients obtained from the Soay pedigree, where paternal links were inferred using the same panel of microsatellite markers. Even when using a relatively complete portion of the pedigree, in which all individuals had known maternal and paternal grandparents, the correlation was found to be weak ( r = −0.207, where mean f = 0.0168). These results add support to the recent prediction that when the mean and variance in inbreeding are low in a population, heterozygosity–fitness correlations can be very weak or even undetectable. The pursuit of more detailed pedigrees offers the best prospect for identifying inbreeding depression within this study population.
- Subjects
SCOTLAND; SOAY sheep; SHEEP breeds; HETEROZYGOSITY; INBREEDING; MOLECULAR ecology; MOLECULAR biology; SAINT Kilda (Scotland)
- Publication
Molecular Ecology, 2005, Vol 14, Issue 11, p3383
- ISSN
0962-1083
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/j.1365-294X.2005.02682.x