Abundant, localized foods can concentrate predators and their foraging efforts, thus altering both the spatial distribution of predation risk and predator preferences for prey that are encountered incidentally. However, few investigations have quantified the spatial scale over which localized foods affect predator foraging behavior and consumption of incidental prey. In spring 2010, we experime...

Coral reefs around the world are rapidly degrading due to a range of environmental stressors. Habitat degradation modifies the sensory landscape within which predator-prey interactions occur, with implications for olfactory-mediated behaviours. Predator naïve settlement-stage damselfish rely on conspecific damage-released odours (i.e., alarm odours) to inform risk assessments. Yet, species such...

Local generalist predators can be exploited in conservation biological control of agricultural pests. To conserve and promote the most important predators, it is critical to have detailed knowledge about their prey range under natural conditions. I have studied predator-prey interactions between lycosid spiders from the genus Pardosa and a major aphid pest in spring-sown cereals; Rhopalosiphum ...

In agroecosystems, local and landscape features, as well as natural enemy abundance and richness, are significant predictors of predation services that may result in biological control of pests. Despite the increasing importance of urban gardening for provisioning of food to urban populations, most urban gardeners suffer from high pest problems, and have little knowledge about how to manage the...

A model for two competing prey species and one predator is formulated in which three essential nutrients can limit growth of all populations. Prey take up dissolved nutrients and predators ingest prey, assimilating a portion of ingested nutrients and recycling or respiring the balance. For all species, the nutrient contents of individuals vary and growth is coupled to increasing content of the ...

We studied the predation rate and prey selection of the least weasel (Mustela ni alis ni alis) on its two most common prey species in boreal environments, the bank vole (Clethrionomys glareolus) and the field vole (Microtus agrestis), in large outdoor enclosures. We also studied the response of weasels to odours of the two species in the laboratory. The enclosure experiment was conducted using ...