Our objectives were to refine the phylogeographic puma shoes assessment within South America and to investigate the demographic history of pumas using a coalescent approach. Our results extend previous phylogeographic findings, reassessing the delimitation of historical population units in South America and demonstrating that this species experienced a considerable demographic expansion in the Holocene, ca. 8,000 years ago. Our analyses indicate that this expansion occurred in South America.

Prior to the hypothesized re-colonization of North America, which was therefore inferred to be even more recent. The estimated demographic history supports the interpretation that pumas suffered a severe demographic decline in the Late Pleistocene throughout their distribution, followed by population expansion and re-colonization of the range, puma trainers initiating from South America.The puma ( Puma concolor Linnaeus, 1771) is a large felid that ranges throughout the Americas.

Females tend to occupy smaller areas and disperse shorter distances, thus being more philopatric than males ( Logan and puma suede Sweanor, 2001 ; Maehr et al. , 2002 ). Overall, the species' ecological flexibility and dispersal capabilities have the potential to induce broad genetic connectivity across large geographic areas, unless historical barriers have limited gene flow among populations.Fossil evidence indicates that pumas were already present in North America 0.4 million years ago (MYA) ( Kurtén and Anderson, 1980 ).

In the present study we employ this longer ND5 segment to investigate the evolutionary history puma sliders of P. concolor , with emphasis on South American populations, which were previously found to harbor high levels of diversity and inferred to have played a key role in the historical demography of this species ( Culver et al. , 2000 ). Given that the geographic sampling of South American pumas was limited in that first study, we aimed here to expand the representation of the various regions of this sub-continent.

We obtained blood and tissue samples from 77 pumas including wild individuals captured during field-ecology projects, caught by farmers or road-killed, as well as captive animals with known geographic origin ( Table S1 ). In addition, we also collected data from 109 additional individuals whose DNA was already available in the participant puma uk laboratories, some of which had been used in earlier genetic studies employing different markers .

Culver et al. , 2000 ; Castilho et al. , 2011 ; Miotto et al. , 2011 , 2012 ). Therefore, as a whole we collected novel data from a total of 186 individuals. These samples were originated from a diverse array of geographic regions throughout most of the puma range, with greater emphasis on South America (see Table S1 ). Two samples of Puma yagouaroundi were also included to be used as outgroups in some analyses.To select a marker that would provide suitable information levels.