Data from: Spatial distribution of fishes in a Northwest Atlantic ecosystem in relation to risk of predation by a marine mammal ...
1. Numerous studies have shown that, at spatial scales of metres to several kilometres, animals balance the trade-off between foraging success and predation mortality by increasing their use of safer but less profitable habitats as predation risk increases. However, it is less clear whether prey res...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Dataset |
| Language: | English |
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Dryad
2016
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.n43qf https://datadryad.org/stash/dataset/doi:10.5061/dryad.n43qf |
| Summary: | 1. Numerous studies have shown that, at spatial scales of metres to several kilometres, animals balance the trade-off between foraging success and predation mortality by increasing their use of safer but less profitable habitats as predation risk increases. However, it is less clear whether prey respond similarly at the larger spatiotemporal scales of many ecosystems. 2. We determine whether this behaviour is evident in a large marine ecosystem, the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence (sGSL, 75 000 km2) over a 42-year period. This ecosystem is characterized by a recent increase in the abundance of a large marine predator, the grey seal (Halichoerus grypus Fabricius), by more than an order of magnitude. 3. We compared changes in spatial distribution over the 1971–2012 period between important prey of grey seals (Atlantic cod, Gadus morhua L.; white hake, Urophycis tenuis Mitchill; and thorny skate, Amblyraja radiata Donovan) and non-prey fishes. Distribution was modelled using generalized additive models ... : JAE_DataArchive_SwainBenoîtHammillThis file provides tow-by-tow catch rates of selected fishes, an index of local risk of predation by grey seals and selected environmental information from an anuual bottom-trawl survey of the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence conducted each September since 1971. Please see the accompanying ReadMe file for further details. ... |
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