Raptors and Scavengers

• Main Authors: Doyle, Frank I, Smith, James N M
• Format: Book Part
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford University PressNew York, NY 2001
• Subjects: Alaska; Aquila chrysaetos
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780195133936.003.0016; https://academic.oup.com/book/chapter-pdf/52510993/isbn-9780195133936-book-part-16.pdf

Abstract The principal study to date of the responses of raptorial birds to the snowshoe hare cycle was conducted by Lloyd Keith and colleagues in a mixed farmland/ aspen parkland landscape at Rochester, Alberta. They found that great homed owls (Bubo virginianus) showed strong reproductive and numerical responses to hare abundance (Mclnvaille and Keith 1974, Adamcik et al. 1978). In contrast, red-tailed hawk (Buteo jamaicensis) numbers at Rochester remained stable, even though their reproductive success declined as hares disappeared from the prey base (Adamcik et al. 1979). In Alaska, numbers and breeding success of northern goshawks responded positively to increasing hare abundance (McGowan 1975). Also in Alaska, golden eagles (Aquila chrysaetos) reproduced more successfully during a period of high hare and ptarmigan abundance (McIntyre and Adams 1999). The community and population level responses of other raptors to vole cycles have been studied intensively in Europe (e.g., Korpimaki and Norrdahl 1991) and less intensively in temperate North America (e.g., Phelan and Robertson 1978).