Hi Ontbirders, I thought it would be good to share the news. We have been able to conclusively identify the Ontario Brown Booby as being from the nominate subspecies (leucogaster) from the Caribbean. Marcy Jacklin scraped together some droppings from where the bird was last seen and sent them to me. Kevin Kerr suggested we try to sequence the control region (see <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MtDNA_control_region> for more information on this rapidly evolving, non-coding part of our mitochondrial DNA). Scott Kelso was able to figure out how to isolate the DNA from the dropping and today it all came together and we finally got the data back. This analysis would not have been possible if some folks had not done population genetic work on the species and published their data (see the paper by Morris-Pocock et al (Comparative phylogeography of brown (Sula leucogaster) and red-footed boobies (S. sula): The influence of physical barriers and habitat preference on gene flow in pelagic seabirds).
I have to do some more extensive analyses but the preliminary analyses were conclusive so I do not expect any surprises. We will publish the data in the near future. It's really about time for another good southerly flow of air... Jeff -- Jeff Skevington, Research Scientist Canadian National Collection of Insects, Arachnids and Nematodes Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada 960 Carling Avenue, K.W. Neatby Building Ottawa, ON, K1A 0C6, Canada Phone: 613-759-1647 FAX: 613-759-1927 E-mail: [email protected] _______________________________________________ ONTBIRDS is presented by the Ontario Field Ornithologists - the provincial birding organization. Send bird reports to [email protected] For information about ONTBIRDS including how to unsubscribe visit http://www.ofo.ca/site/page/view/information.ontbirdssetup
