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- Title
Comparison of dietary diversity and niche overlap of sympatric sika deer and roe deer based on DNA barcoding in Northeast China.
- Authors
Liu, Yanhua; Huang, Naiying
- Abstract
To investigate the food composition and overlap in trophic niches of sympatric sika deer (Cervus nippon hortulorum) and roe deer (Capreolus pygargus), we used plant DNA barcoding to qualitatively assess winter food composition in their feces. We collected feces from sika deer and roe deer in the southern Laoyeling and extracted fecal DNA, amplified it using primers for the rbcL gene region of the plant, and sequenced it using high-throughput sequencing techniques. We analyzed 40 valid fecal samples in winter (20 from sika deer and 20 from roe deer). The results showed 56 families, 84 genera, and 84 species of plants for sika deer and 51 families, 83 genera, and 84 species for roe deer. Unlike traditional methods, using DNA barcoding revealed a large number of herbage plants in the winter food composition (43.90% for sika deer and 51.50% for roe deer). NMDS plot reveals significant ecological niche differentiation (R = 0.3062, P < 0.05) between sika deer and roe deer. Our study successfully applied DNA barcoding to the study of ungulates' feeding habits.
- Subjects
SIKA deer; ROE deer; GENETIC barcoding; FOOD composition; PLANT DNA; DNA primers
- Publication
European Journal of Wildlife Research, 2023, Vol 69, Issue 6, p1
- ISSN
1612-4642
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s10344-023-01745-4