期刊
ECOLOGY LETTERS
卷 25, 期 4, 页码 981-991出版社
WILEY
DOI: 10.1111/ele.13975
关键词
behaviour; demography; food supplementation; Lepus americanus; population ecology; predator-sensitive foraging
类别
资金
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
- Northern Studies Training Program
- University of Alberta Northern Research Award program
- Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies
- W. Garfield Weston Foundation
- Government of Yukon
Snowshoe hare cycles are a significant ecological phenomenon. Food limitation and predation can interact and affect the survival and reproduction of snowshoe hares.
Snowshoe hare cycles are one of the most prominent phenomena in ecology. Experimental studies point to predation as the dominant driving factor, but previous experiments combining food supplementation and predator removal produced unexplained multiplicative effects on density. We examined the potential interactive effects of food limitation and predation in causing hare cycles using an individual-based food-supplementation experiment over-winter across three cycle phases that naturally varied in predation risk. Supplementation doubled over-winter survival with the largest effects occurring in the late increase phase. Although the proximate cause of mortality was predation, supplemented hares significantly decreased foraging time and selected for conifer habitat, potentially reducing their predation risk. Supplemented hares also lost less body mass which resulted in the production of larger leverets. Our results establish a mechanistic link between how foraging time, mass loss and predation risk affect survival and reproduction, potentially driving demographic changes associated with hare cycles.
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