Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Carbone, Chris
• Gittleman, John L.

Titel

A Common Rule for the Scaling of Carnivore Density

Ist Teil von

• Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science), 2002-03, Vol.295 (5563), p.2273-2276

Ort / Verlag

Washington, DC: American Society for the Advancement of Science

Erscheinungsjahr

2002

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Population density in plants and animals is thought to scale with size as a result of mass-related energy requirements. Variation in resources, however, naturally limits population density and may alter expected scaling patterns. We develop and test a general model for variation within and between species in population density across the order Cannivora. We find that 10,000 kilograms of prey supports about 90 kilograms of a given species of carnivore, irrespective of body mass, and that the ratio of carnivore number to prey biomass scales to the reciprocal of carnivore mass. Using mass-specific equations of prey productivity, we show that carnivore number per unit prey productivity scales to carnivore mass near -0.75, and that the scaling rule can predict population density across more than three orders of magnitude. The relationship provides a basis for identifying declining carnivore species that require conservation measures.