We quantified the oxygen uptake rates (VO(2)) and time spent, during the constriction, inspection, and ingestion of prey of different relative sizes, by the prey-constricting boid snake Boa constrictor amarali. Time spent in prey constriction varied from 7.6 to 16.3 min, and VO(2) during prey constriction increased 6.8-fold above resting values. This was the most energy expensive predation phas...

A large variety of predatory species rely on their visual abilities to locate their prey. However, the search for prey may be hampered by prey camouflage. The most prominent example of concealing coloration is background-matching prey coloration characterized by a strong visual resemblance of prey to the background. Even though this principle of camouflage was recognized to efficiently work in ...

scientists are interested in find out “how to use living resources without damaging the ecosystem at the same time?” from nineteen century because the living resources are limited. thus, the harvested rate is used as the control parameters. moreover, the study of harvested population dynamics is more realistic.    in the present paper, some predator-prey models in which two ecologically interac...

The functional response of the tiger beetle Megacephala carolina carolina L. (Coleoptera: Carabidae) was determined on adult twolined spittlebug, Prosapia bicincta (Say) (Hemiptera: Cercopidae), and fourth instars of fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda (J.E. Smith) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae), in single-prey and two-prey systems. In the laboratory,M. carolina carolina demonstrateda type II functi...

The traps of many carnivorous plants are red in colour. This has been widely hypothesized to serve a prey attraction function; colour has also been hypothesized to function as camouflage, preventing prey avoidance. We tested these two hypotheses in situ for the carnivorous plant Drosera rotundifolia. We conducted three separate studies: (i) prey attraction to artificial traps to isolate the inf...

searching efficiency is a key parameter of functional response which is in turn the major components in the selection of predators and parasitoids for biological control. searching efficiency of scymnus syriacus mulsant feeding on aphis craccivora koch was determined at five different experimental arenas (i.e. 195, 247, 304, 385 and 650 cm2) on broad bean (vicia fabae l.). to do this, functiona...

Optimal diet theory (ODT) postulates that predators adjust their foraging decisions by calculating a prey value from the potential biomass gain, handling time, prey vulnerability and encounter rate. Tests of ODT have however so far mainly been restricted to laboratory settings. By video surveillance, we gathered a large data set of more than 2000 field observations of crab spider (Misumena vati...

Heterogeneity among prey in their susceptibility to predation is a potentially important stabilizer of predator-prey interactions, reducing the magnitude of population oscillations and enhancing total prey population abundance. When microevolutionary responses of prey populations occur at time scales comparable to population dynamics, adaptive responses in prey defense can, in theory, stabilize...

We develop a theory for the food intake of a predator that can switch between multiple prey species. The theory addresses empirical observations of prey switching and is based on the behavioural assumption that a predator tends to continue feeding on prey that are similar to the prey it has consumed last, in terms of, e.g., their morphology, defences, location, habitat choice, or behaviour. Fro...