Disease and competition, not just predation, as drivers of impacts of the black rat ( Rattus rattus) on island mammals
Abstract H anna & C ardillo (2014) report an association between the presence of black rats ( R attus rattus ) and extinctions of endemic mammals on A ustralian islands. Although we agree that introductions of the black rat are likely to have had a significant impact on island ecosystems, we sug...
| Published in: | Global Ecology and Biogeography |
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| Main Authors: | , |
| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Wiley
2014
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/geb.12220 https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Fgeb.12220 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/geb.12220 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1111/geb.12220 |
| Summary: | Abstract H anna & C ardillo (2014) report an association between the presence of black rats ( R attus rattus ) and extinctions of endemic mammals on A ustralian islands. Although we agree that introductions of the black rat are likely to have had a significant impact on island ecosystems, we suggest that there is little empirical support for their main conclusion, that predation (and thus mesopredator processes) is the causal mechanism driving the association between the presence of black rats and extinctions of native mammals on Australian islands. We present a brief literature review of evidence for two alternative mechanisms – introduction of novel diseases and competition – which suggest there are multiple explanations for how native mammal extinctions on Australian islands may have occurred. The potential impact of these processes interacting across different trophic levels is rarely considered, but is applicable across many different ecosystems world‐wide. |
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