The Tibet red deer, Cervus elaphus wallichi, is a middling and primitive living member of the Cervidae family. Tibet red deer were once wildly distributed in Tibet, Sikkim, Nepal and Bhutan. However, in the last century their range and number was drastically reduced because of overhunting. In 1992, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) announced that Tibet red deer in the wild had become extinct. Subsequently, there were very few reports of Tibet red deer in the wild. In July 2005, we investigated the distribution of Tibet red deer and discovered a population of red deer in southeast Tibet. From the body size, morphometric traits and hair color, we thought it was likely to be Tibet red deer. We collected 123 fecal samples from the red deer distribution area and analyzed the cytochrome b gene sequences from the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) of the samples. We used BLAST (mega blast) at NCBI to identify sequences with the highest similarities (>97%) and the lowest differences (<3%) to the published cytB sequence, AY044861, of the Tibet red deer (Cervus elaphus wallichi). 105 samples were identified as having high sequence similarity to the red deer (Cervus elaphus wallichi) sequence. We carried out genotype analysis using eleven microsatellites to identify individuals in the 105 fecal samples and obtained 54 different genotypes. Forensic medicine criteria and the results of data analyses allow the identification of different individuals according to genotypes. On the basis of forensic medicine criteria, when the genotype is in full accord with a probability of 10^-14, then we may assume that the genotype represents either one individual or identical twins.
Tibet red deer is an endemic species in China. Systematic and detailed ecological research on Tibet red deer is almost nonexistent. To further understand its ecological characteristics and to effectively manage its protection, basic research is urgently required. In this study, we investigated the genetic diversity and gene flow in three Tibet red deer populations by analyzing 731 base pairs of the mtDNA cytB gene fragment in 54 individuals sampled from Zengqi, Woka and Baidui. Twenty-four variable sites and fourteen haplotypes were identified. The red deer exhibited high mtDNA diversity with both haplotype diversity (h=0.897±0.014) and nucleotide diversity (π=2.781±0.02465). The estimates of Tajima's D and Fu and Li's D did not deviate significantly from the neutral selection hypothesis (P > 0.1) for all three populations of deer, showing no evidence of strong selective sweeps or balancing selection. An analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) showed abundant gene flow (5.36>Nm>1.87) among the three populations. Therefore, we suggest that the three populations can be regarded as one unit for conservation and management.