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Cyclic prey evolution with cannibalistic predators.

Sami O Lehtinen1, Stefan A H Geritz1

  • 1Department of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Helsinki, FIN 00014, Finland.

Journal of Theoretical Biology
|July 3, 2019
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Predator cannibalism can drive prey to evolve cyclical timidity. This occurs when predator behavior creates ecological instability, reversing evolutionary trends and leading to fluctuating prey responses.

Keywords:
Adaptive dynamicsEcological bistabilityFold bifurcation of periodic orbitsSubcritical Hopf bifurcationSupercritical Hopf bifurcation

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Area of Science:

  • Ecology
  • Evolutionary Biology
  • Mathematical Biology

Background:

  • Prey species often evolve timidity to avoid predation.
  • Predator behavior, such as cannibalism, can significantly influence prey evolution.
  • Ecological dynamics can impact evolutionary trajectories.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate how predator cannibalism affects the evolution of prey timidity.
  • To explore the ecological and evolutionary consequences of predator-induced bistability.
  • To identify conditions leading to evolutionary cycling in prey behavior.

Main Methods:

  • Developed an individual-level ecological model of prey-predator interactions.
  • Incorporated predator cannibalism on conspecific juveniles.
  • Applied bifurcation analysis and adaptive dynamics to study ecological bistability and evolutionary scenarios.

Main Results:

  • Identified ecological bistability between equilibrium and periodic attractors.
  • Classified ten distinct evolutionary scenarios driven by ecological bistability.
  • Demonstrated that ecological attractor switching can reverse evolutionary direction, leading to evolutionary cycling of timidity.
  • Showed that cannibalism is essential for ecological bistability and evolutionary cycling.

Conclusions:

  • Predator cannibalism fundamentally alters prey ecological dynamics and evolutionary pathways.
  • Cannibalistic predator behavior can induce complex evolutionary cycles in prey timidity.
  • The presence or absence of predator cannibalism dramatically changes the potential for ecological bistability and evolutionary cycling.