Meeting Abstract
A key aspect in the conservation of endangered populations is understanding their underlying genetic structure. The blue-throated macaw is endemic to Bolivia and is one of the most endangered species of macaw, with an estimated 250 birds remaining in the wild. Like many parrots, the blue-throated macaw has sizeable populations in zoos and private ownership. This raises interesting questions about the genetic diversity within, and the genetic relatedness between wild and captive populations. Our goal is to assess genetic variation in wild and captive populations to inform conservation efforts for this highly endangered species. We genotyped 66 wild individuals from Bolivia and 54 captive individuals from the US, Canada and Bolivia at 12 polymorphic microsatellite loci to determine genetic diversity and relatedness. We examined population structure using a Bayesian clustering approach and calculated population F statistics to determine the extent of population structure. Our results using STRUCTURE show that wild Bolivian populations are genetically distinct from captive populations; this result was echoed by a significant pairwise Fst value of 0.059 between the two populations. Ongoing analyses will test for the presence of population bottlenecks and inbreeding in both captive and wild populations. These results will help inform ongoing efforts to manage wild populations and augment them with the release of captive-bred individuals.
