DOI: 10.5061/dryad.h9w0vt4n3
title: Data from: Metabarcoding of fecal pellets in wild muskox populations reveals negative relationships between microbiome and diet alpha diversity

description: Microbiome diversity and diet composition concomitantly influence species
 health, fitness, immunity, and digestion. In environments where diet
 varies spatially and temporally, microbiome plasticity may promote rapid
 host adaptation to available resources. For northern ungulates in
 particular, metabarcoding of noninvasively collected fecal pellets
 presents unprecedented insights into their diverse ecological requirements
 and niches by clarifying the interrelationships of microbiomes, key to
 deriving nutrients, in context of altered forage availability in changing
 climates. Muskoxen (Ovibos moschatus) are Arctic-adapted species that
 experience fluctuating qualities and quantities of vegetation. Geography
 and seasonality have been noted to influence microbiome composition and
 diversity in muskoxen, yet it is unclear how their microbiomes intersect
 with diet. Following observations from other species, we hypothesized
 increasing diet diversity would result in higher microbiome diversity in
 muskoxen. We assessed diet composition in muskoxen using three common
 plant metabarcoding markers and explored correlations with microbiome
 data. Patterns of dietary diversity and composition were not fully
 concordant among the markers used, yet all reflected the primary
 consumption of willows and sedges. Individuals with similar diets had more
 similar microbiomes, yet in contrast to most literature, yielded negative
 relationships between microbiome and diet alpha diversity. This negative
 correlation may reflect the unique capacities of muskoxen to survive
 solely on high-fiber Arctic forage and provide insight into their
 resiliency to exploit changing dietary resources in a rapidly warming
 Arctic altering vegetation diversity.
description: DNA from fecal samples were extracted using the Qiagen Power
 Fecal DNA extraction kit. The Illumina 16S metagenomic library protocol
 was followed using ITS2, RBCL, and TRNL markers.
description: Data includes raw fastq files for each sample. Each raw file
 includes reads from ITS2, RBCL and TRNL.
description: # Muskox Diet Metabarcoding from Metabarcoding of fecal pellets in wild
 muskox populations reveals negative relationships between microbiome alpha
 diversity and diet. --- In this study, we amplify three common plant
 markers, TRNL, RBCL, and ITS from fecal samples to assess the diet of wild
 muskoxen across much of their Canadian range. Sampling from across
 different ecozones and seasons was performed to better understand the
 spectrum of wild muskoxen diets and how diet is influenced by geography
 and seasonality. We then compared the diversity and composition of the
 diet to that of the microbiome to determine how vegetation in different
 landscapes contribute to bacterial variation in muskox gut microbiomes, in
 context of their high fibre diet. These data provide insight into the
 plasticity of microbiomes relative to vegetation availability, which in
 turn also allow for predictions of the long-term impact climate change and
 concomitant vegetation changes have on muskox viability. ## Description of
 the Data and file structure This data includes raw sequence files for each
 sample used in this study. Each sample is labelled with it's sample
 ID and contains reads associated with all three markers utilized in this
 study (TRNL, RBCL and ITS2). This dataset also includes the OTU tables in
 a biom format for all three markers individually. The biom file can be
 imported into R and identifies organisms to the order level. The biom
 files also include the metadata information which includes season and
 ecozone the samples were collected. Finally it contains an excel mapping
 file in Qiime2 format that can also be imported into R. The mapping files
 include the metadata for each sample used including ecozone and season
 collected. ## Sharing/access Information n/a