Ecological Genetics of the Wild Rabbit in Australia. II. Protein Variation in British, French and Australian Rabbits and the Geographical Distribution of the Variation in Australia

Abstract

A survey for genetic variation was carried out using 21 proteins controlled by 26 loci in rabbits from Britain, Mediterranean France and Australia. Five enzymes, adenosine deaminase, phosphogluconate dehydrogenase, carboxylesterase, carbonate dehydratase and dihydrolipoamide reductase (NAD+) were found to be polymorphic. The average heterozygosity in wild rabbits was 6%. The genetic distances separating the various populations indicated that three different stocks were present in these populations. The rabbits from Britain and mainland Australia belonged to one group, those from France to a second group and the rabbits from southern Tasmania were a distinctive third group. Highly significant differences in gene frequency were found between the various local populations studied from mainland Australia. This variation showed no clear pattern and was attributed to genetic drift due to small effective population sizes. Bottlenecks in population size occur regularly in local rabbit populations in Australia through, for example, drought, myxomatosis outbreaks or rabbit control programs.