RT info:eu-repo/semantics/article
T1 Spatial relationships and mechanisms of coexistence between dominant and subordinate top predators
A1 Rebollo de la Torre, Salvador
A1 Martínez Hesterkamp, Sara
A1 García Salgado, Gonzalo Jesús
A1 Pérez Camacho, Lorenzo
A1 Fernández Pereira, José Manuel
A1 Jenness , Jeff
K1 Medio Ambiente
K1 Environmental science
AB Most forest ecosystems contain a diverse community of top-level predators. How these predator species interact, and howtheir interactions infl uence their spatial distribution is still poorly understood.Here we studied interactions among top predators in a guild of diurnal forest raptors in order to test the hypothesisthat predation among competing predators (intraguild predation) signifi cantly aff ects the spatial distribution of predatorspecies, causing subordinate species to nest farther away from the dominant ones.Th e study analyzed a guild in southwestern Europe comprising three raptor species. For 8 years we studied the spatialdistribution of used nests, breeding phenology, intraguild predation, territory occupancy, and nest-builder species andsubsequent nest-user species.Th e subordinate species (sparrowhawk Accipiter nisus ) nested farther away from the dominant species (goshawk A. gentilis), which preyed on sparrowhawks but not on buzzards Buteo buteo , and closer to buzzards, with which sparrowhawks donot share many common prey. Th is presumably refl ects an eff ort to seek protection from goshawks. Th is potential positiveeff ect of buzzards on sparrowhawks may be reciprocal, because buzzards benefi t from old sparrowhawk nests, which buzzardsused as a base for their nests, and from used sparrowhawk nests, from which buzzards stole prey. Buzzards occasionallyoccupied old goshawk nests.
SN 0908-8857
YR 2017
FD 2017
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10017/41166
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10017/41166
LA eng
NO Universidad de Alcalá de Henares
DS MINDS@UW
RD 26-abr-2024