Show simple item record

dc.contributor.authorIms, Rolf Anker
dc.contributor.authorHenden, John-André
dc.contributor.authorThingnes, Anders Voss
dc.contributor.authorKillengreen, Siw Turid
dc.date.accessioned2022-06-07T11:59:17Z
dc.date.available2022-06-07T11:59:17Z
dc.date.issued2013-12-23
dc.description.abstractProduction cycles in birds are proposed as prime cases of indirect interactions in food webs. They are thought to be driven by predators switching from rodents to bird nests in the crash phase of rodent population cycles. Although rodent cycles are geographically widespread and found in different rodent taxa, bird production cycles appear to be most profound in the high Arctic where lemmings dominate. We hypothesized that this may be due to arctic lemmings inducing stronger predator responses than boreal voles. We tested this hypothesis by estimating predation rates in dummy bird nests during a rodent cycle in low-Arctic tundra. Here, the rodent community consists of a spatially variable mix of one lemming (Lemmus lemmus) and two vole species (Myodes rufocanus and Microtus oeconomus) with similar abundances. In consistence with our hypothesis, lemming peak abundances predicted well crash-phase nest predation rates, whereas the vole abundances had no predictive ability. Corvids were found to be the most important nest predators. Lemmings appear to be accessible to the whole predator community which makes them particularly powerful drivers of food web dynamics.en_US
dc.identifier.citationIms RA, Henden JAH, Thingnes AV, Killengreen St. Indirect food web interactions mediated by rodent cycles: Relative roles of lemmings and voles. Biology Letters. 2013;9(6)en_US
dc.identifier.cristinIDFRIDAID 1065114
dc.identifier.doi10.1098/rsbl.2013.0802
dc.identifier.issn1744-9561
dc.identifier.issn1744-957X
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10037/25389
dc.language.isoengen_US
dc.publisherThe Royal Society Publishingen_US
dc.relation.journalBiology Letters
dc.rights.accessRightsopenAccessen_US
dc.rights.holderCopyright 2013 The Author(s)en_US
dc.titleIndirect food web interactions mediated by rodent cycles: Relative roles of lemmings and volesen_US
dc.type.versionpublishedVersionen_US
dc.typeJournal articleen_US
dc.typeTidsskriftartikkelen_US
dc.typePeer revieweden_US


File(s) in this item

Thumbnail

This item appears in the following collection(s)

Show simple item record