Title
Secondary Contact and Hybridization in the Texas Cave Salamanders Eurycea neotenes and E. tridentifera
Files
Download Full Text
Publication Date
May 1984
Abstract
Unusual levels of individual and populational variation and character discordance in three samples of troglobitic Eurycea from the Edwards Plateau of central Texas indicate hybridization between Eurycea neotenes and E. tridentifera. The two species are microsympatric but exhibit habitat segregation in one case, are contiguously allopatric in the same cave system in another, and appear to interact as vagrants in the third. E. neotenes and E. tridentifera seem to be evolving reproductive isolation at Honey Creek Cave, where hybrids are uncommon. Eurycea troglodytes and E. latitans are shown to be invalid taxa, the former consisting of a hybrid swarm of temporally variable composition and the latter being a troglobitic population of E. neotenes which episodically incorporates individuals of E. tridentifera. Variation in the interactions of the parental species on contact is ascribed to differences in the opportunity for ecological segregation permitted, the relative frequencies of incursion of the parental taxa through time, and differences in the escape behavior of intermediate and advanced troglobites in cave systems which periodically receive influxes of flood-borne epigean fish.
Keywords
Caves, Sinkholes, Hybrid Species, Specimens, Salamanders, Taxa, Creeks, Farming Systems, Vertebrae, Discriminants
Document Type
Article
Notes
Copeia, Vol. 1984, no. 2 (1984-05-01).
Identifier
SFS0069539_00001
Recommended Citation
Sweet, Samuel S., "Secondary Contact and Hybridization in the Texas Cave Salamanders Eurycea neotenes and E. tridentifera" (1984). KIP Articles. 4739.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/kip_articles/4739