Links between mouse and vole social networks and their gut microbiomes support predictions from metacommunity theory

ABSTRACT Metacommunity theory predicts that strongly connected individuals will harbour similar gut microbiomes (GMs) and affiliating with more individuals should increase GM diversity. Additionally, cross-species bacterial transmission may play a role in how interspecific interactions affect host community dynamics. We tracked sympatric mice ( Peromyscus maniculatus ) and voles ( Myodes gapperi ) and constructed social networks for each species and both species together. We tested whether: 1) similarity in GM composition between individuals correlates with their social proximity within and across species; 2) GM diversity correlates with a host’s number of conspecific or heterospecific neighbours. We could not differentiate associations between GM composition and mouse social proximity or habitat. In voles, social proximity explained part of the GM composition. GM composition associated with interspecific social proximity, and mouse GM diversity correlated with number of vole neighbours. Contributions of host-host bacterial transmission to the GM partly follow metacommunity theory but depend on host species.