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Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size

Habitat reduction could drive biodiversity loss if the capacity of food webs to support predators is undermined by habitat-size constraints on predator body size. Assuming that (i) available space restricts predator body size, (ii) mass-specific energy needs of predators scale with their body size,...

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Autores principales: McIntosh, Angus R., McHugh, Peter A., Plank, Michael J., Jellyman, Phillip G., Warburton, Helen J., Greig, Hamish S.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: American Association for the Advancement of Science 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6031369/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29978038
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aap7523
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author McIntosh, Angus R.
McHugh, Peter A.
Plank, Michael J.
Jellyman, Phillip G.
Warburton, Helen J.
Greig, Hamish S.
author_facet McIntosh, Angus R.
McHugh, Peter A.
Plank, Michael J.
Jellyman, Phillip G.
Warburton, Helen J.
Greig, Hamish S.
author_sort McIntosh, Angus R.
collection PubMed
description Habitat reduction could drive biodiversity loss if the capacity of food webs to support predators is undermined by habitat-size constraints on predator body size. Assuming that (i) available space restricts predator body size, (ii) mass-specific energy needs of predators scale with their body size, and (iii) energy availability scales with prey biomass, we predicted that predator biomass per unit area would scale with habitat size (quarter-power exponent) and prey biomass (three-quarter–power exponent). We found that total predator biomass scaled with habitat size and prey resources as expected across 29 New Zealand rivers, such that a unit of habitat in a small ecosystem supported less predator biomass than an equivalent unit in a large ecosystem. The lower energetic costs of large body size likely mean that a unit of prey resource supports more biomass of large-bodied predators compared to small-bodied predators. Thus, contracting habitat size reduces the predator mass that can be supported because of constraints on predator body size, and this may be a powerful mechanism exacerbating reductions in biodiversity due to habitat loss.
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spelling pubmed-60313692018-07-05 Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size McIntosh, Angus R. McHugh, Peter A. Plank, Michael J. Jellyman, Phillip G. Warburton, Helen J. Greig, Hamish S. Sci Adv Research Articles Habitat reduction could drive biodiversity loss if the capacity of food webs to support predators is undermined by habitat-size constraints on predator body size. Assuming that (i) available space restricts predator body size, (ii) mass-specific energy needs of predators scale with their body size, and (iii) energy availability scales with prey biomass, we predicted that predator biomass per unit area would scale with habitat size (quarter-power exponent) and prey biomass (three-quarter–power exponent). We found that total predator biomass scaled with habitat size and prey resources as expected across 29 New Zealand rivers, such that a unit of habitat in a small ecosystem supported less predator biomass than an equivalent unit in a large ecosystem. The lower energetic costs of large body size likely mean that a unit of prey resource supports more biomass of large-bodied predators compared to small-bodied predators. Thus, contracting habitat size reduces the predator mass that can be supported because of constraints on predator body size, and this may be a powerful mechanism exacerbating reductions in biodiversity due to habitat loss. American Association for the Advancement of Science 2018-07-04 /pmc/articles/PMC6031369/ /pubmed/29978038 http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aap7523 Text en Copyright © 2018 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) , which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, so long as the resultant use is not for commercial advantage and provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
McIntosh, Angus R.
McHugh, Peter A.
Plank, Michael J.
Jellyman, Phillip G.
Warburton, Helen J.
Greig, Hamish S.
Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size
title Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size
title_full Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size
title_fullStr Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size
title_full_unstemmed Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size
title_short Capacity to support predators scales with habitat size
title_sort capacity to support predators scales with habitat size
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6031369/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29978038
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aap7523
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