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Frequency of multiple paternity varies between two populations of brown smoothhound shark, Mustelus henlei

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Abstract

Multiple paternity was recently observed in a population of the brown smoothhound shark, Mustelus henlei, from Las Barrancas, Baja California Sur, Mexico, with litters demonstrating the greatest percentage of multiple paternity for any shark species (93 % of litters and an average number of sires = 2.3). To determine whether this frequency is consistent elsewhere in the species’ range, 4 polymorphic microsatellite loci were used to determine the frequency of multiple paternity in 18 litters of M. henlei from Santa Catalina Island, CA, sampled in 2004, 2008, and 2012. Multiple paternity varied among sampling years with 2004 demonstrating multiple sires for 40 % of sampled litters (n = 10) with an average of 1.4 sires per litter and 2008/2012 demonstrating a total lack of multiply sired litters (n = 8). Although multiple paternity was detected in this study, the range of frequencies observed is lower than that observed in the Mexican population. Based on these findings, investigators should take location into consideration when assessing the existence of multiple paternity in future studies of elasmobranch species.

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Acknowledgments

This work would not have been possible without the help of everyone who provided and collected samples for this project, especially Natalie Martinez-Takeshita, Mike Takeshita, Corinne Paterson, Mike Schram, Susanne Plank, Andrew Nosal, and Felipe Galván-Magaña. The completion of this work was facilitated by John Pollinger’s laboratory and analytical assistance as well as Jacqueline Robinson’s assistance with phenol–chloroform DNA extraction. Robert K. Wayne provided lab space for all of the genetic aspects of this project. Insightful discussions with John November pertaining to statistical analyses of the data were illuminating. Donald G. Buth, Paul H. Barber, Edward J. Heist, Larry G. Allen, David K. Jacobs, and V. Reggie Edgerton provided valuable comments on the earlier draft of this paper. Genotyping was performed at the UCLA Genotyping and Sequencing Core. Funding was provided by the UCLA Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Student Research Award, and the Lerner-Gray Fund for Marine Research provided by the American Museum of Natural History.

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  1. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, USA

    Chris L. Chabot

  2. Department of Biology, California State University, Northridge, CA, 91130, USA

    Chris L. Chabot & Brent M. Haggin

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  1. Chris L. Chabot
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Correspondence to Chris L. Chabot.

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Communicated by T. Reusch.

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Chabot, C.L., Haggin, B.M. Frequency of multiple paternity varies between two populations of brown smoothhound shark, Mustelus henlei . Mar Biol 161, 797–804 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-013-2378-2

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