Rabid versus non-rabid raccoons Sample Clauses

Rabid versus non-rabid raccoons. The overall sex ratio of the population was 1:1 (85 male, 87 female, 10 unknown sex) as was the sex ratio of the 26 rabid raccoons (12 male, 12 female, 2 unknown sex), revealing no bias towards male or female infection. All rabid raccoons possessed mitochondrial haplotypes that were common in the northeastern Ohio region. Of the 16 identified haplotypes, 12 were found in the vicinity of the majority of rabid raccoon captures. Rabid raccoons were sampled from 10 of these mitochondrial lineages (Figure 2.4), 3 of which only have been found in Ohio. OH4 is of particular interest in that 4 of the 5 sampled individuals (80%) were rabid. In another instance, 6/15 individuals (40%) within the OH10 haplotype were rabid. No clear relationship was observed, however, with respect to haplotype distribution and RRV infection. For example, OH4 was sampled only in a 2 county area corresponding to most of the rabid raccoon captures whereas OH10 was found over a much larger 7 county area. For 6 additional haplotypes, all of which were circulating among 2 or more counties, at least 25% of the sampled raccoons were rabid while another 6 low-frequency haplotypes failed to show evidence of RRV infection and were limited in distribution to a single county. Therefore, RRV occurrence does not appear to be heavily influenced by raccoon genetic structure, as inferred from the distribution of mitochondrial DNA haplotypes.