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Vol. 31: 13–17, 2016 ENDANGERED SPECIES RESEARCH Published August 19 doi: 10.3354/esr00745 Endang Species Res OPENPEN ACCESSCCESS Using genetic data to predict the vulnerability of a native predator to a toxic invader Richard Shine1,*,**, Supen Wang2,**, George Madani1, Kyle N. Armstrong3,4, Libiao Zhang5, Yi-Ming Li2 1School of Life and Environmental Sciences A08, University of Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia 2Diversity and Spatial Ecology Research Group, Key Laboratory of Animal Ecology and Conservation Biology, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, PR China 3School of Biological Sciences, The University of Adelaide, South Australia 5005, Australia 4South Australian Museum, Adelaide, South Australia 5000, Australia 5Guangdong Entomological Institute, Guangzhou 510260, PR China ABSTRACT: Australia has no native toad species, and as a consequence, many Australian pre - dators lack resistance to the toxins of the invasive cane toad Rhinella marina, and die if they ingest one of these toads. Resistance is conferred by a small and consistent genetic change, so genetic data can provide a rapid, non-invasive way to clarify the vulnerability of as-yet-unstudied taxa. To evaluate the hypothesis that a recent decline of ghost bat Macroderma gigas populations in tropical Australia is due to ingestion of cane toads, we sequenced the H1-H2 extracellular domain of the sodium-potassium-ATPase. Two anuran-eating Asian relatives of the Australian species possess the genes that confer bufotoxin resistance, but the ghost bat does not. Like varanid lizards (major victims of the toad invasion), Australian ghost bats appear to have lost their physiological resistance to toad toxins but retained generalist foraging behaviours, potentially including a readiness to attack toads as well as frogs. Our genetic data suggest that cane toads may imperil populations of this iconic predator, and detailed behavioural and ecological studies are warranted. KEY WORDS: Alien species · Bufo marinus · Conservation genetics · Megadermatidae INTRODUCTION The toads’ powerful chemical defences are fatal to many native predators that attempt to consume toads Given the vast number of taxa potentially at risk of because Australia has no native bufonids, and thus extinction, we need rapid and effective ways to iden- local predators have had no opportunity to adapt to tify the most vulnerable species. Genetic screening bufonid toxins over evolutionary time (Llewelyn et al. technologies are providing new options in conserva- 2010). As a result, the toad invasion has caused tion biology, such as assays of environmental DNA to abrupt population declines in predatory marsupials, detect low-density populations of invasive species crocodiles, elapid snakes and varanid lizards (Shine (Tingley et al. 2015) and the use of faecal-DNA-based 2010). In contrast, many predators within the native approaches to identify the prey of threatened species range of bufonids (e.g. Asia) can consume toads (Reed et al. 1997). We have used genetic methods in without ill effect, because of distinctive (conver- another conservation context — to predict the vulner- gently evolved) modifications in the H1-H2 extra - ability of a native species to a toxic invader. cellular domain of the sodium-potassium-ATPase, Cane toads Rhinella marina are causing ecological which can increase resistance to bufonid toxins havoc as they spread through Australia (Shine 2010). (cardiac glycosides-bufadienolides, and cardenolides © The authors 2016. Open Access under Creative Commons by *Corresponding author: [email protected] Attribution Licence. Use, distribution and reproduction are un - **These authors contributed equally to this work restricted. Authors and original publication must be credited. Publisher: Inter-Research · www.int-res.com 14 Endang Species Res 31: 13–17, 2016 or ouabain) more than 3000-fold (Ujvari et al. 2013, toads as a cause for ghost bat decline. If both 2015). Asian and Australian bats can tolerate bufonid tox- The vulnerability of an Australian species to toad ins, toads cannot be a risk factor. If neither species invasion might thus depend on its phylogenetic and can tolerate those toxins, the ability of Asian bats biogeographic history. Predatory taxa closely related to behaviourally avoid toxic toads (Marimuthu & to Asian species (birds, rodents, colubrid snakes) ex - Neuweiler 1987) suggests that these animals pos- hibit an ability to tolerate bufonid toxins, and thus are sess appropriate behavioural (ra ther than physio- not impacted by cane toad arrival (Cabrera-Guzmán logical) traits that would buffer them against cane et al. 2015). In contrast, a long period of en demism toad invasion. We might thus expect Australian (and thus, toad allopatry) in Australia might create bats to have similar behaviours, unless these have vulnerability if resistance to bufonid toxins is lost been eroded by genetic drift or counter-selection. through genetic drift or counter-selection (Shine 2010, Lastly, if the Asian bat is resistant to bufadienolides Ujvari et al. 2015). but the ghost bat is not, the ancestral condition of Impacts of toads on Australian bats have not been toxin tolerance may have been lost in the ghost studied, but at least one species may be vulnerable bat lineage due to long allopatry with toads in (White 2014). With a wingspan of around 60 cm, the Australia — as occurs in Australian varanid lizards, ghost bat Macroderma gigas is one of the world’s which have exhibited massive population crashes largest microchiropterans and (uniquely amongst coincident with toad invasion (Shine 2010). Testing Australia’s bat fauna) includes anurans in its diet physiological sensitivity of live bats to toxins raises (Douglas 1967). The ghost bat’s low reproductive a host of logistical and ethical problems, but there out put and stringent roosting requirements exacer- is a simple solution — we can examine tissue sam- bate its vulnerability (Churchill & Helman 1990). ples to see whether the bats exhibit the distinctive Dependence on isolated roosting and breeding caves genetic signature of bufonid toxin resistance reduces migration between populations (Worthing- (Ujvari et al. 2015). ton Wilmer et al. 1999). The distribution of ghost bats has contracted in recent years, with the species now extinct from southern and central Australia (Chur - MATERIALS AND METHODS chill & Helman 1990). Ghost bat colonies have more recently disappeared from tropical sites where they We obtained ethanol-preserved tissue of 8 ghost were once common (White 2014). Lethal toxic inges- bats from across their Australian range (Northern tion of cane toads might partly explain that decline Territory n = 2; Queensland n = 1), including areas based on a correlation between toad distribution and and colonies in Western Australia not yet exposed to bat colonies and a single observation of a dead ghost the cane toad invasion (Pilbara n = 2; Kimberley n = 3), bat with a cane toad in its gut (White 2014). Cer- and single specimens of 3 related Asian species (the tainly, ghost bats often feed on prey on the ground vespertilionids Ia io and Myotis ricketti (pilosus) and (Tidemann et al. 1985) and take relatively large prey, the megadermatid Megaderma lyra). DNA was ex - in cluding anurans (Vestjens & Hall 1977, Boles 1999). tracted using a procedure modified from Wang et al. Even small toads (<10 g) are toxic enough to kill (2014): 3 mg of each sample was placed in 100 µl of predators much larger than ghost bats (Shine 2010, lysis buffer (1 mg ml−1 proteinase K, 0.1 M EDTA, Pearson et al. 2014). Thus, the toad invasion plausibly 0.01 M NaCl, 0.01 M Tris-HCl [pH 8.0] and 0.5% has caused substantial mortality of ghost bats. How- Nonidet P-40) and vortexed for 1 min at 16°C; the ever, other causes of endangerment are also plausi- remaining tissue was pelleted by brief centrifuga- ble based on concurrent anthropogenic disturbances tion; samples were incubated at 55°C for 24 h and and the declines of small mammals in tropical Aus- then at 100°C for 20 min, followed by a final centrifu- tralia (perhaps due to changed fire regimes and/or gation at 13 021 × g for 3 min at 4°C; the extract was cat predation; Woinarski et al. 2014). then diluted to one-fifth of its original concentration A relative of the ghost bat on the Indian subcon- for PCR amplification. tinent and throughout Indochina, the greater false Amplification of the initial extracellular loop, in - vampire bat Megaderma lyra, is sympatric with cluding parts of the H1-H2 domain transmembrane the similarly toxic bufonid Duttaphrynus melano - regions, was performed using the primers of Moore stictus, and feeds on frogs and toads (Advani 1981, et al. (2009): ATP1_178Fwd (WGA RAT CCT GGC Hand 1996). We can thus identify 3 possible sce- ACG AGA TG) and ATP1_178Rvs (GAG GMA CCA narios, only one of which would implicate cane TGT TCT TGA AGG). The annealing temperature Shine et al.: Genetic data predict vulnerability 15 was 56°C for 35 cycles. Products were cloned using effect on resistance to toxins. We infer that ghost the pEASY-T1 Simple Cloning Vector kit based on bats are sensitive to ouabain and thus to bufonid the manufacturer’s protocol (TransGen Biotech) and toxins. In contrast, sequences of 2 Asian bat taxa, we selected ≥15 clones per PCR product for sequen- Myotis ricketti and Megaderma lyra, were identical cing using M13 forward primers (Tsingke Biological to those of toxin-resistant rodents (Price & Lingrel Technology). All sequence differences were con- 1988) (Table 1). firmed by a second round of PCR amplification and sequencing. Sequence fragments were compared with sequences deposited in GenBank using BLAST DISCUSSION algorithms, and finally the nucleotide and correspon- ding amino acid sequences were aligned in MEGA6.0 Our analyses reveal a worst-case scenario — Aus- (Tamura et al. 2013). tralian ghost bats appear to lack resistance to bufonid toxins, whereas their anuran-eating Asian relative Megaderma lyra possesses that resistance.