Table 1.

Variability at 31 autosomal microsatellites in three cat subspecies (domestic cat F. s. catus; African wildcat F. s. libyca; and European wildcat F. s. silvestris) and in five European wildcat biogeographic groups identified by Bayesian clustering analyses

Subspecies	Populations	Acronym	N	N A	nar	H O	H E	F IS	HWE	LE
Domestic cats	All	Fca	293	15.3 (4.9)	9.6	0.68 (0.09)	0.79 (0.09)	0.14*	22	3
African wildcats	All	Fli	26	10.3 (2.6)	10.3	0.72 (0.10)	0.83 (0.05)	0.13*	2	0
European wildcats	All	Fsi	609	14.2 (3.1)	8.0	0.59 (0.17)	0.73 (0.19)	0.19*	30	81
	Group 1	Fsi‐1	141	9.8 (2.3)	7.7	0.63 (0.18)	0.69 (0.18)	0.09*	6	4
	Group 2	Fsi‐2	132	9.8 (2.2)	7.9	0.58 (0.18)	0.70 (0.19)	0.18*	14	1
	Group 3	Fsi‐3	40	6.3 (2.4)	6.1	0.54 (0.18)	0.64 (0.18)	0.15*	3	4
	Group 4	Fsi‐4	214	10.2 (3.0)	7.7	0.60 (0.19)	0.70 (0.20)	0.16*	21	23
	Group 5	Fsi‐5	82	9.7 (2.8)	8.7	0.59 (0.18)	0.75 (0.19)	0.19*	16	1

The European wildcats were clustered into: group 1 (north‐eastern Alps, Dinaric Alps, Bulgary, and Poland; Fsi‐1); 2 (peninsular Italy, Sicily; Fsi‐2); 3 (central Germany; Fsi‐3); 4 (south‐western Germany and central Europe including Belgium, Switzerland, and Luxembourg; Fsi‐4); 5 (Portugal, Spain; Fsi‐5). All putative hybrids and two introgressed populations (Scotland and Hungary) were excluded. N = sample size; N _A (standard deviations in parenthesis); and N _AR = mean number of alleles and allelic richness per locus (N _AR obtained for n = 26, the number of African wildcats); H _O and H _E = observed and expected heterozygosity (standard errors in parenthesis); F _IS = inbreeding coefficient (*significant departures from HWE at P < 0.001, Bonferroni corrected); HWE and LE = number of loci (HWE) and pairwise correlation tests (LE) out of Hardy–Weinberg and linkage equilibrium.