Genetic assessment of the San Clemente Island loggerhead shrike reveals evidence of historical gene flow with Santa Catalina Island

The San Clemente loggerhead shrike (Lanius ludovicianus mearnsi) is an endangered species endemic to San Clemente Island in California. Previous genetic analyses of the California shrike populations have had mixed results due to small sample sizes and/or few genetic markers. Here we present a rigorous analysis of 381 historical and contemporary California shrike samples genotyped at 11 new polymorphic microsatellite loci and the mitochondrial …