Natural N. vectensis populations are associated with specific microbiota.

(A) Sampling sites map. The base layer was obtained at https://www.diva-gis.org/Data. (B) PCoA (based on Jaccard metric, sampling depth = 5,000) illustrating similarity of bacterial communities based on geographic location of the March-field samples; (C) beta-diversity distance box plots within and between geographic locations, differences were tested through Mann–Whitney U-test (*** = p ≤ 0.001); (D) alpha-diversity comparisons between geographic locations (max rarefaction depth = 5,000, num. steps = 10), differences were tested through Kruskal–Wallis test followed by Dunn’s post hoc comparisons (H = 12.63, * = p ≤ 0.05, ** = p ≤ 0.01); (E) relative abundance of main bacterial groups among different geographic locations. NS (Nova Scotia), ME (Maine), NH (New Hampshire), MA (Massachusetts), NC (North Carolina). Underlying data can be found in S1 Data.