Following severe population decline and local extinction due to massive habitat destruction and persecution, wildcats have recently reappeared in several parts of Germany’s low mountain region. It remains unknown how this reemergence occurred, specifically if local populations have been overlooked at low densities or if the species has successfully spread across the highly fragmented anthropogenic landscape. In the central German Rhön Mountains, for instance, wildcats were believed to be extinct during most of the twentieth century, however, the species was recently detected and subsequent genetic monitoring found the presence of a sizeable population. In this study, we used microsatellite and SNP genotypes from 146 wildcat individuals from 2008 to 2017 across a ~ 15,000 km² area in the central German low mountain region to understand the population re-establishment of wildcats in the region. Bayesian clustering and subsequent analyses revealed that animals in the Rhön Mountains appear to be a mix from the two adjacent populations in the North and South of the area, suggesting a recent range expansion from two different directions. Both populations meet in the Rhön Biosphere Reserve, leading to an admixture of the northern, autochthonous, and the southern reintroduced wildcat population. While we cannot completely exclude the possibility of undetected population persistence, the high genetic homogeneity in the central German wildcat population and the lack of any signatures of past population decline in the Rhön favor a scenario of natural expansion. Our findings thus suggest that wildcats are well capable of rapid range expansion across richly structured landscape mosaics consisting of open land, settlements, and forest patches and document the potential of massive non-invasive genetic sampling when aiming to reconstruct the complex population and range dynamics of wildlife.

由于大规模的栖息地破坏和迫害导致人口严重下降和局部灭绝之后，最近在德国低山区的一些地区又出现了野猫。这种重新出现是如何发生的仍是未知的，特别是如果在低密度下忽略了当地种群，或者该物种是否已成功地在高度分散的人为景观中传播。例如，在德国中部的罗恩山脉，人们认为野猫在整个二十世纪的大部分时间里已经灭绝，但是最近发现了该物种，随后的遗传监测发现了庞大的种群。在这项研究中，我们使用了2008年至2017年间146个野猫个体的微卫星和SNP基因型，分布范围约为15,000 km ²在德国中部低山区地区进行了解，以了解该地区野猫的种群重建情况。贝叶斯聚类和随后的分析表明，罗恩山脉的动物似乎是该地区北部和南部两个相邻种群的混合体，这表明最近范围从两个不同的方向扩展。两种种群在罗恩生物圈保护区相遇，导致北部，本地和南部再次引入野猫种群。尽管我们不能完全排除人口未被发现的持久性的可能性，但德国中部野猫种群的高度遗传同质性以及罗恩地区过去种群数量下降的任何迹象均不支持自然扩张。