Dataset Information

Selective Predation of a Stalking Predator on Ungulate Prey.

ABSTRACT: Prey selection is a key factor shaping animal populations and evolutionary dynamics. An optimal forager should target prey that offers the highest benefits in terms of energy content at the lowest costs. Predators are therefore expected to select for prey of optimal size. Stalking predators do not pursue their prey long, which may lead to a more random choice of prey individuals. Due to difficulties in assessing the composition of available prey populations, data on prey selection of stalking carnivores are still scarce. We show how the stalking predator Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx) selects prey individuals based on species identity, age, sex and individual behaviour. To address the difficulties in assessing prey population structure, we confirm inferred selection patterns by using two independent data sets: (1) data of 387 documented kills of radio-collared lynx were compared to the prey population structure retrieved from systematic camera trapping using Manly's standardized selection ratio alpha and (2) data on 120 radio-collared roe deer were analysed using a Cox proportional hazards model. Among the larger red deer prey, lynx selected against adult males-the largest and potentially most dangerous prey individuals. In roe deer lynx preyed selectively on males and did not select for a specific age class. Activity during high risk periods reduced the risk of falling victim to a lynx attack. Our results suggest that the stalking predator lynx actively selects for size, while prey behaviour induces selection by encounter and stalking success rates.

SUBMITTER: Heurich M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4993363 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Selective Predation of a Stalking Predator on Ungulate Prey.

Heurich Marco M Zeis Klara K Küchenhoff Helmut H Müller Jörg J Belotti Elisa E Bufka Luděk L Woelfing Benno B

PloS one 20160822 8

Prey selection is a key factor shaping animal populations and evolutionary dynamics. An optimal forager should target prey that offers the highest benefits in terms of energy content at the lowest costs. Predators are therefore expected to select for prey of optimal size. Stalking predators do not pursue their prey long, which may lead to a more random choice of prey individuals. Due to difficulties in assessing the composition of available prey populations, data on prey selection of stalking ca ...[more]

PMID: 27548478

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Project description:Abstract The behavioral mechanisms by which predators encounter prey are poorly resolved. In particular, the extent to which predators engage in active search for prey versus incidentally encountering them has not been well studied in many systems and particularly not for neonate prey during the birth pulse. Parturition of many large herbivores occurs during a short and predictable temporal window in which young are highly vulnerable to predation. Our study aims to determine how a suite of carnivores responds to the seasonal pulse of newborn ungulates using contemporaneous global positioning system (GPS) locations of four species of predators and two species of prey. We used step‐selection functions to assess whether coyotes, cougars, black bears, and bobcats encountered parturient adult female ungulates more often than expected by chance in a low‐density population of mule deer and a high‐density population of elk. We then assessed whether the carnivore species that encountered parturient prey more often than expected by chance did so by shifting their habitat use toward areas with a high probability of encountering neonates. None of the four carnivore species encountered GPS‐collared parturient mule deer more often than expected by chance. By contrast, we determined that cougar and male bear movements positioned them in the proximity of GPS‐collared parturient elk more often than expected by chance which may provide evidence of searching behavior. Although both male bears and cougars exhibited behavior consistent with active search for neonates, only male bears used elk parturition habitat in a way that dynamically tracked the phenology of the elk birth pulse suggesting that maximizing encounters with juvenile elk was a motivation when selecting resources. Our results suggest that there is high interspecific and intersexual variability in foraging strategies among large mammalian predators and their prey. Understanding the extent to which predators engage in active search for prey versus incidentally encountering them is important because active search can exert a stabilizing force on prey populations by alleviating predation pressure on low‐density prey and increasing it for high‐density prey. Parturition of many large herbivores occurs during a short and predictable temporal window in which young are highly vulnerable to predation. Our study aims to determine how a suite of carnivores responds to the seasonal pulse of newborn ungulates using contemporaneous GPS locations of four species of predators and two species of prey.

Dataset Information

Selective Predation of a Stalking Predator on Ungulate Prey.

Publications

Selective Predation of a Stalking Predator on Ungulate Prey.

Similar Datasets

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