Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies
Spatial coherence between predators and prey has rarely been observed in pelagic marine ecosystems. We used measures of the environment, prey abundance, prey quality, and prey distribution to explain the observed distributions of three co-occurring predator species breeding on islands in the southea...
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ftrepec:oai:RePEc:plo:pone00:0053348 2024-04-14T08:09:50+00:00 Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies Kelly J Benoit-Bird Brian C Battaile Scott A Heppell Brian Hoover David Irons Nathan Jones Kathy J Kuletz Chad A Nordstrom Rosana Paredes Robert M Suryan Chad M Waluk Andrew W Trites https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348&type=printable unknown https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348&type=printable article ftrepec 2024-03-19T10:30:41Z Spatial coherence between predators and prey has rarely been observed in pelagic marine ecosystems. We used measures of the environment, prey abundance, prey quality, and prey distribution to explain the observed distributions of three co-occurring predator species breeding on islands in the southeastern Bering Sea: black-legged kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla), thick-billed murres (Uria lomvia), and northern fur seals (Callorhinus ursinus). Predictions of statistical models were tested using movement patterns obtained from satellite-tracked individual animals. With the most commonly used measures to quantify prey distributions - areal biomass, density, and numerical abundance - we were unable to find a spatial relationship between predators and their prey. We instead found that habitat use by all three predators was predicted most strongly by prey patch characteristics such as depth and local density within spatial aggregations. Additional prey patch characteristics and physical habitat also contributed significantly to characterizing predator patterns. Our results indicate that the small-scale prey patch characteristics are critical to how predators perceive the quality of their food supply and the mechanisms they use to exploit it, regardless of time of day, sampling year, or source colony. The three focal predator species had different constraints and employed different foraging strategies – a shallow diver that makes trips of moderate distance (kittiwakes), a deep diver that makes trip of short distances (murres), and a deep diver that makes extensive trips (fur seals). However, all three were similarly linked by patchiness of prey rather than by the distribution of overall biomass. This supports the hypothesis that patchiness may be critical for understanding predator-prey relationships in pelagic marine systems more generally. Article in Journal/Newspaper Bering Sea rissa tridactyla Uria lomvia Callorhinus ursinus uria RePEc (Research Papers in Economics) Bering Sea |
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Spatial coherence between predators and prey has rarely been observed in pelagic marine ecosystems. We used measures of the environment, prey abundance, prey quality, and prey distribution to explain the observed distributions of three co-occurring predator species breeding on islands in the southeastern Bering Sea: black-legged kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla), thick-billed murres (Uria lomvia), and northern fur seals (Callorhinus ursinus). Predictions of statistical models were tested using movement patterns obtained from satellite-tracked individual animals. With the most commonly used measures to quantify prey distributions - areal biomass, density, and numerical abundance - we were unable to find a spatial relationship between predators and their prey. We instead found that habitat use by all three predators was predicted most strongly by prey patch characteristics such as depth and local density within spatial aggregations. Additional prey patch characteristics and physical habitat also contributed significantly to characterizing predator patterns. Our results indicate that the small-scale prey patch characteristics are critical to how predators perceive the quality of their food supply and the mechanisms they use to exploit it, regardless of time of day, sampling year, or source colony. The three focal predator species had different constraints and employed different foraging strategies – a shallow diver that makes trips of moderate distance (kittiwakes), a deep diver that makes trip of short distances (murres), and a deep diver that makes extensive trips (fur seals). However, all three were similarly linked by patchiness of prey rather than by the distribution of overall biomass. This supports the hypothesis that patchiness may be critical for understanding predator-prey relationships in pelagic marine systems more generally. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Kelly J Benoit-Bird Brian C Battaile Scott A Heppell Brian Hoover David Irons Nathan Jones Kathy J Kuletz Chad A Nordstrom Rosana Paredes Robert M Suryan Chad M Waluk Andrew W Trites |
spellingShingle |
Kelly J Benoit-Bird Brian C Battaile Scott A Heppell Brian Hoover David Irons Nathan Jones Kathy J Kuletz Chad A Nordstrom Rosana Paredes Robert M Suryan Chad M Waluk Andrew W Trites Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies |
author_facet |
Kelly J Benoit-Bird Brian C Battaile Scott A Heppell Brian Hoover David Irons Nathan Jones Kathy J Kuletz Chad A Nordstrom Rosana Paredes Robert M Suryan Chad M Waluk Andrew W Trites |
author_sort |
Kelly J Benoit-Bird |
title |
Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies |
title_short |
Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies |
title_full |
Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies |
title_fullStr |
Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies |
title_full_unstemmed |
Prey Patch Patterns Predict Habitat Use by Top Marine Predators with Diverse Foraging Strategies |
title_sort |
prey patch patterns predict habitat use by top marine predators with diverse foraging strategies |
url |
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348&type=printable |
geographic |
Bering Sea |
geographic_facet |
Bering Sea |
genre |
Bering Sea rissa tridactyla Uria lomvia Callorhinus ursinus uria |
genre_facet |
Bering Sea rissa tridactyla Uria lomvia Callorhinus ursinus uria |
op_relation |
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0053348&type=printable |
_version_ |
1796307319027400704 |