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Journal of Heredity Advance Access published online on December 12, 2006
Journal of Heredity, doi:10.1093/jhered/esl043
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© The American Genetic Association. 2006. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org.

Microsatellite Diversity and Fitness in Stranded Juvenile Harp Seals (Phoca groenlandica)

Maria Kretzmann, Laura Mentzer, Robert DiGiovanni, Jr, Matthew S. Leslie, and George Amato

From the Southampton College of Long Island University, 239 Montauk Highway, Southampton, NY 11968 (Kretzmann and Mentzer); the Riverhead Foundation for Marine Research and Preservation, 428 East Main Street, Riverhead, NY 11901 (DiGiovanni); and the American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West at 79th Street, New York, NY 10024 (Leslie and Amato). Maria Kretzmann is now at 1737 Hill Drive, South Pasadena, CA 91030

Address correspondence to Dr. M. Kretzmann at the address above, or e-mail: maria.kretzmann{at}liu.edu.

A positive relationship between genetic diversity at neutral markers and juvenile survival has been demonstrated for many vertebrate populations, although the correlation is typically weak and the explanation for it remains controversial. We assessed variation at 9–12 microsatellite loci in 65 juvenile harp seals (Phoca groenlandica) that stranded in poor condition around Long Island, NY, from 2001 to 2004. Compared with seals that died, surviving individuals had slightly higher measures of mean d2, which reflects the size difference between alleles within an individual and provides an index of outbreeding. In contrast, there were no significant differences between survivors and nonsurvivors in heterozygosity or estimates of internal relatedness. This pattern is attributed to the fact that these microsatellite markers were exceptionally variable in this species (9–22 alleles per locus), and all individuals were heterozygous at most loci. Under these circumstances, mean d2 may provide a powerful measure for assessing diversity–fitness correlations.


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