Go with the flow: water velocity regulates herbivore foraging decisions in river catchments

Wood, Kevin A.; Stillman, Richard A.; Wheeler, Dave; Groves, Steve; Hambly, Catherine; Speakman, John R.; Daunt, Francis; O’Hare, Matthew T.

doi:10.1111/j.1600-0706.2013.00592.x

Cited by 30 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 40 publications

(65 reference statements)

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“…This assumption is likely to be true very generally (Bautista, Tinbergen, & Kacelnik, 2001;Bautista, Tinbergen, Wiersma, & Kacelnik, 1998;Berger & Gotthard, 2008;Cooper & Sherbrooke, 2013;Helfman & Winkelman, 1991;Lourdais et al, 2014;Williams & Yeates, 2004;Wood, Stillman, Wheeler, Groves, Hambly, et al, 2013). (3) Optimal foraging theory is based on the concept of natural selection as a fitnessmaximizing algorithm, where fitness is assumed to depend on the dominant costs and benefits associated with behavioural options.…”

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confidence: 99%

Foraging mode switching: the importance of prey distribution and foraging currency

Higginson

Ruxton

2015

Animal Behaviour

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Keywords:deep sea fish ectotherms marginal value theorem optimal foraging patch use prey distribution resource heterogeneity search strategy sit-and-wait Foraging methods are highly variable, but can be grouped into two modes: searching and ambush. While research has focused on the functioning of each mode, the question of how animals choose which to use has been largely neglected. Here we consider a forager that exploits prey that are patchily distributed in space and time. This forager can either sit and wait for prey to appear or search for prey, which is more likely to result in encounters with prey but costs more energy and/or exposes the forager to greater predation risk. The currency that natural selection appears to have optimized will be determined by the additional costs of searching and whether there is a risk of starvation. We therefore compare the predictions of models based on currencies that consider only energy and predation risk to state-dependent models in which energy reserves are used to trade off predation rate, starvation rate and investment in growth. The choice of currency qualitatively affects how mode should change when prey abundance and prey patchiness increase. We show how differing prey distributions can explain variation in effects of experimentally increasing prey abundance. Our work has several implications for the study of foraging mode, population dynamics and the methods used to assess population size.

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confidence: 99%

Foraging mode switching: the importance of prey distribution and foraging currency

Higginson

Ruxton

2015

Animal Behaviour

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“…In comparison, for Whooper Swans (Cygnus cygnus) the most important activity was feeding, while only 28% of their day was spent swimming (Black and Rees 1984). Swimming is an energetically expensive activity for Mute Swans and the key factor influencing the behavioral decision to switch between terrestrial and aquatic feeding habitats (Wood et al 2013). Therefore, using wind for transportation may have impact on the daily energy spent.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If the Mute Swan would have been swimming at the same speed, the energetic cost would have been~12 times the basal metabolic rate (BMR). This figure is based on the energetic cost of swimming in Mute Swans as developed by Wood et al (2013) where the cost of swimming (in W) is equal to 314.9 v 2 À 87.2 v þ 59.0 (v velocity in m/s). For the speed 1.3 m/s, the energy is thus 477.8 W, which with a BMR of 39 W (as calculated by Wood et al 2013) is 12.25 times the BMR.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This figure is based on the energetic cost of swimming in Mute Swans as developed by Wood et al (2013) where the cost of swimming (in W) is equal to 314.9 v 2 À 87.2 v þ 59.0 (v velocity in m/s). For the speed 1.3 m/s, the energy is thus 477.8 W, which with a BMR of 39 W (as calculated by Wood et al 2013) is 12.25 times the BMR. As a comparison, twelve times the BMR is equivalent to the energy cost for a human playing squash (Taylor et al 1978).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Windsurfing in Mute Swans (Cygnus olor)

Terenius

2016

The Wilson Journal of Ornithology

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“…Grazing by flocks of swans affects <0.5 km reaches of river, and only affects a minority of river sites, typically for short periods (<6 weeks) before the flock moves on [44]. Previous research has shown that this pattern of swan habitat selection is determined by changes in the relative profitability of different feeding areas within the landscape [47]. Swan grazing damage to river macrophytes is a particular problem between early-May, when the swan flocks enter the river [47], and mid-June when most individuals move to the estuary to moult [45].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Can Sacrificial Feeding Areas Protect Aquatic Plants from Herbivore Grazing? Using Behavioural Ecology to Inform Wildlife Management

et al. 2014

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Effective wildlife management is needed for conservation, economic and human well-being objectives. However, traditional population control methods are frequently ineffective, unpopular with stakeholders, may affect non-target species, and can be both expensive and impractical to implement. New methods which address these issues and offer effective wildlife management are required. We used an individual-based model to predict the efficacy of a sacrificial feeding area in preventing grazing damage by mute swans (Cygnus olor) to adjacent river vegetation of high conservation and economic value. The accuracy of model predictions was assessed by a comparison with observed field data, whilst prediction robustness was evaluated using a sensitivity analysis. We used repeated simulations to evaluate how the efficacy of the sacrificial feeding area was regulated by (i) food quantity, (ii) food quality, and (iii) the functional response of the forager. Our model gave accurate predictions of aquatic plant biomass, carrying capacity, swan mortality, swan foraging effort, and river use. Our model predicted that increased sacrificial feeding area food quantity and quality would prevent the depletion of aquatic plant biomass by swans. When the functional response for vegetation in the sacrificial feeding area was increased, the food quantity and quality in the sacrificial feeding area required to protect adjacent aquatic plants were reduced. Our study demonstrates how the insights of behavioural ecology can be used to inform wildlife management. The principles that underpin our model predictions are likely to be valid across a range of different resource-consumer interactions, emphasising the generality of our approach to the evaluation of strategies for resolving wildlife management problems.

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Go with the flow: water velocity regulates herbivore foraging decisions in river catchments

Cited by 30 publications

References 40 publications

Foraging mode switching: the importance of prey distribution and foraging currency

Foraging mode switching: the importance of prey distribution and foraging currency

Windsurfing in Mute Swans (Cygnus olor)

Can Sacrificial Feeding Areas Protect Aquatic Plants from Herbivore Grazing? Using Behavioural Ecology to Inform Wildlife Management

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