Preliminary Dietary Analysis of Spotted Seals Based on DNA Metabarcoding
The study of feeding habits of wild animals is the core content of understanding the habitat requirements of ani-mals,which is of great significance to the protection and management of wild animals.In this study,the fecal samples of spotted seals(Phoca largha)in Liaodong Bay,China were collected from their traditional breeding sites and Panjin habitat area.We used 12S rRNA as a molecular marker to amplify fecal DNA and identified its food composition by high-throughput sequencing.A total of 16 species of bait fish belonging to five orders,eight families and 13 genera were identified in the spotted seals feces.The relative abundance of food composition showed that Liza haematocheilus was the dominant food(40.72％),followed by Gobiidae species(23.18％).The relative abundance of sampling populations at different genus level showed that the top three species were Liza(31.91％),Chaeturichthys(14.06％),and Tridentiger(8.39％)in the northern ice region of Liaodong Bay in 2021(BQ_21).Liza(42.37％),Acanthogobius(14.06％),and Chaeturichthys(11.17％)in the northern ice region of Liaodong Bay in 2023(BQ_23),and Liza(47.93％),Chaeturichthys(13.93％),and Zoarces(12.18％)in the Liaohe River Estuary in Panjin in 2023(LH_23),respectively.They top three species ac-counted for 54.36％,67.60％,and 74.04％of the relative abundance of the food composition of spotted seals in BQ_21,BQ_23,and LH_23,respectively.Our research results were consistent with the dominant species of fishery resources in the northern part of Liaodong Bay,indicating that the spotted seal in Liaodong Bay was an euryphagous species,and its food diversity mainly depended on the habitat sea area,season,and the abundance of the main prey species.
Spotted seals(Phoca lar-gha)DNA metabarcoding12S rRNADietary analysisBreeding period
万方数据
维普
