Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 118, Issue 30, Pages -Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2022892118
Keywords
insect outbreaks; habitat selection; species interactions; species conservation; apparent competition
Categories
Funding
- Sentinel North program of Universite Laval
- Canada First Research Excellence Fund
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)-Laval University Industrial Research Chair in Silviculture and Wildlife
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This study demonstrates how the introduction of insect pests can impact predator-prey relationships among large mammals, potentially affecting the entire ecosystem. Human activities may also exacerbate these impacts.
While the important role of animal-mediated interactions in the top-down restructuring of plant communities is well documented, less is known of their ensuing repercussions at higher trophic levels. We demonstrate how typically decoupled ecological interactions may become intertwined such that the impact of an insect pest on forest structure and composition alters predator-prey interactions among large mammals. Specifically, we show how irruptions in a common, cyclic insect pest of the boreal forest, the spruce budworm (Choristoneura fumiferana), modulated an indirect trophic interaction by initiating a flush in deciduous vegetation that benefited moose (Alces alces), in turn strengthening apparent competition between moose and threatened boreal caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) via wolf (Canis lupus) predation. Critically, predation on caribou postoutbreak was exacerbated by human activity (salvage logging). We believe our observations of significant, largescale reverberating consumer-producer-consumer interactions are likely to be common in nature.
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