Musical chairs mortality functions: density-dependent deaths caused by competition for unguarded refuges |
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Authors: | Jameal F Samhouri Richard R Vance Graham E Forrester Mark A Steele |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1606, USA;(2) Department of Natural Resources Science, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, RI 02881, USA;(3) Department of Biology, California State University at Northridge, 18111 Nordhoff Street, Northridge, CA 91330-8303, USA;(4) NOAA Fisheries, Northwest Fisheries Science Center, 2725 Montlake Blvd. E, Seattle, WA 98112, USA |
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Abstract: | Structural refuges within which prey can escape from predators can be an important limiting resource for the prey. In a manner
that resembles the childhood game of musical chairs, many prey species rapidly retreat to shared, unguarded refuges whenever
a predator threatens, and only when refuges are relatively abundant do all prey individuals actually escape. The key feature
of this process is that the per capita prey mortality rate depends on the ratio of prey individuals to refuges. We introduce
a new class of mortality functions with this feature and then demonstrate statistically that they describe field mortality
data from a well-studied coral reef fish species, the Caribbean bridled goby Coryphopterus glaucofraenum, substantially better than do several mortality functions of more conventional form.
J. F. Samhouri and R. R. Vance contributed equally to this work. |
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Keywords: | Refuges Mortality functions Coral reef fish Density dependence Coryphopterus glaucofraenum |
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