Moving animals on a landscape through translocations and reintroductions is an important management tool used in the recovery of endangered species, particularly for the maintenance of population genetic diversity and structure. Management of imperiled amphibian species rely heavily on translocations and reintroductions, especially for species that have been brought to the brink of extinction by habitat loss, introduced species, and disease. One striking example of amphibian declines and associated management efforts is in California's Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks with the mountain yellow‐legged frog species complex (Rana sierrae/muscosa ). Mountain yellow‐legged frogs have been extirpated from more than 93% of their historic range, and limited knowledge of their population genetics has made long‐term conservation planning difficult. To address this, we used 598 archived skin swabs from both extant and extirpated populations across 48 lake basins to generate a robust Illumina‐based nuclear amplicon data set. We found that samples grouped into three main genetic clusters, concordant with watershed boundaries. We also found evidence for historical gene flow across watershed boundaries with a north‐to‐south axis of migration. Finally, our results indicate that genetic diversity is not significantly different between populations with different disease histories. Our study offers specific management recommendations for imperiled mountain yellow‐legged frogs and, more broadly, provides a population genetic framework for leveraging minimally invasive samples for the conservation of threatened species.

中文翻译：

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踏入过去，保护未来：现有和灭绝种群的存档棉签为濒临灭绝的两栖动物的遗传管理提供了信息。

通过易位和再引入在景观上移动动物是重要的管理工具，可用于恢复濒危物种，特别是用于维持种群遗传多样性和结构。对濒临灭绝的两栖动物物种的管理在很大程度上依赖于易位和重新引入，特别是对于那些由于栖息地丧失，引入的物种和疾病而濒临灭绝的物种。两栖动物数量减少和相关管理工作的一个显着例子是加利福尼亚的红杉和金斯峡谷国家公园，那里有山地黄脚蛙物种复合体（Rana sierrae / muscosa）。黄脚蛙已从其历史范围的93％以上被灭绝，而且对其种群遗传学的了解有限，使长期的保护计划变得困难。为了解决这个问题，我们使用了来自48个湖流域的现存和灭绝种群的598个存档棉签，生成了基于Illumina的可靠核扩增子数据集。我们发现样本与流域边界一致，分为三个主要的遗传簇。我们还发现了历史基因跨越具有南北向迁移轴的流域边界流动的证据。最后，我们的结果表明，具有不同疾病史的人群之间的遗传多样性没有显着差异。我们的研究为受威胁的山地黄脚蛙提供了具体的管理建议，更广泛地讲，