Ortak çalışma: Lyciasalamandra Türlerinin Moleküler Ekolojisi ve Korunması
Project no. 530 · Status: Kapanmış · 2015
Summary
The goal of this project was to resolve the taxonomy and phylogeny of Lyciasalamandra using molecular methods. There were nine described species at the beginning of our project within the genus Lyciasalamandra in Turkey, of which six are threatened, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). According to our next generation sequencing (NGS) analyses results, there are seven Lyciasalamandra species inhabiting in Turkey. We also delimited the species distributions in the light of our new information and draw the new detailed distribution maps for each species. Using our new GPS data and previously published information we modelled the potential distribution of 7 endemic species of Lycian salamanders in Turkey based on bioclimatic and environmental variables using GIS and Maxent desktop software. Within its naturally restricted range, the major potential threats to all Turkish Lycian salamanders are mainly confined to first two headings that are habitat loss and over collection for scientific purposes. Habitat loss mainly caused by forest fires, construction of roads, summer homes, quarries and dams, loss of breeding sites through pollution. Latter threat is increased in the last decade. In the beginning people tried to describe species by collecting great amount of live specimens in the wild with morphological traits. However lately it is well understood that morphology or old fashion traditional methods are not solely enough to describe true or valid species. Therefore, recently more people continued to describe subspecies using morphological traits by again collecting great deal of live specimens from the natural habitats of Lycian salamanders. Despite the national and international laws and guidelines regarding the research and scientific collecting of threatened species, such scientific progress is unfortunately ongoing on these groups. As a result of our project, we scientifically suggest that uncontrolled overharvesting of these endangered specimens for the scientific studies of species by the national and international scientists must stop.