Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem
Studying the effects of prey distribution on predator behavior is complex in systems where there are multiple prey species. The role of prey density in predator behavior is rarely studied in closed ecosystems of one predator species and one prey species, despite these being an ideal opportunity to t...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:6972874 2023-05-15T13:40:25+02:00 Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem Busdieker, Karl M. Patrick, Samantha C. Trevail, Alice M. Descamps, Sébastien 2019-12-13 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6972874/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31993119 https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5899 en eng John Wiley and Sons Inc. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6972874/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31993119 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5899 © 2019 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. CC-BY Original Research Text 2019 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5899 2020-02-02T01:28:09Z Studying the effects of prey distribution on predator behavior is complex in systems where there are multiple prey species. The role of prey density in predator behavior is rarely studied in closed ecosystems of one predator species and one prey species, despite these being an ideal opportunity to test these hypotheses. In this study, we investigate the effect of prey density on the foraging behavior of a predatory species in an isolated Antarctic ecosystem of effectively a single predatory species and a single prey species. We use resource selection models to compare prey density in areas utilized by predators (obtained from fine‐scale GPS telemetry data) to prey density at randomly generated points (pseudoabsences) throughout the available area. We demonstrate that prey density of breeding Antarctic petrels (Thalassoica antarctica) is negatively associated with the probability of habitat use in its only predator, the south polar skua (Catharacta maccormicki). Skuas are less likely to utilize habitats with higher petrel densities, reducing predation in these areas, but these effects are present during chick rearing only and not during incubation. We suggest that this might be caused by successful group defense strategies employed by petrel chicks, primarily spitting oil at predators. Text Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica Catharacta maccormicki Thalassoica antarctica PubMed Central (PMC) Antarctic Ecology and Evolution 10 1 350 359 |
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Original Research Busdieker, Karl M. Patrick, Samantha C. Trevail, Alice M. Descamps, Sébastien Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem |
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Original Research |
description |
Studying the effects of prey distribution on predator behavior is complex in systems where there are multiple prey species. The role of prey density in predator behavior is rarely studied in closed ecosystems of one predator species and one prey species, despite these being an ideal opportunity to test these hypotheses. In this study, we investigate the effect of prey density on the foraging behavior of a predatory species in an isolated Antarctic ecosystem of effectively a single predatory species and a single prey species. We use resource selection models to compare prey density in areas utilized by predators (obtained from fine‐scale GPS telemetry data) to prey density at randomly generated points (pseudoabsences) throughout the available area. We demonstrate that prey density of breeding Antarctic petrels (Thalassoica antarctica) is negatively associated with the probability of habitat use in its only predator, the south polar skua (Catharacta maccormicki). Skuas are less likely to utilize habitats with higher petrel densities, reducing predation in these areas, but these effects are present during chick rearing only and not during incubation. We suggest that this might be caused by successful group defense strategies employed by petrel chicks, primarily spitting oil at predators. |
format |
Text |
author |
Busdieker, Karl M. Patrick, Samantha C. Trevail, Alice M. Descamps, Sébastien |
author_facet |
Busdieker, Karl M. Patrick, Samantha C. Trevail, Alice M. Descamps, Sébastien |
author_sort |
Busdieker, Karl M. |
title |
Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem |
title_short |
Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem |
title_full |
Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem |
title_fullStr |
Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem |
title_full_unstemmed |
Prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an Antarctic ecosystem |
title_sort |
prey density affects predator foraging strategy in an antarctic ecosystem |
publisher |
John Wiley and Sons Inc. |
publishDate |
2019 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6972874/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31993119 https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5899 |
geographic |
Antarctic |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica Catharacta maccormicki Thalassoica antarctica |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica Catharacta maccormicki Thalassoica antarctica |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6972874/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31993119 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5899 |
op_rights |
© 2019 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5899 |
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Ecology and Evolution |
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10 |
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1 |
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350 |
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359 |
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1766133235392184320 |