Area-restricted foraging both consumes and creates resource patchiness
Evidence
In a sense, the existence of patchiness in resource distribution favors the development of arearestricted search behavior, but the consequence of this behavior is to concentrate feeding in localized patches, thus depleting them in relation to the surroundings and creating patchiness in turn. What sets the limits to this positive feedback system? One possible mechanism is suggested by the marginal value theorem. If, indeed, individuals cease foraging in a patch when its value is decreased to the average value for the habitat as a whole (Charnov, 1976), such a strategy would over time tend to reduce the difference in quality between patches until all were virtually identical, at which point foraging would presumably cease to be patch oriented. — S. T. A. Pickett and P. S. White, eds., The Ecology of Natural Disturbance and…, 1228
The potential for area-restricted searching to create resource patchiness would seem to be limited to situations in which renewal rates are intermediate. If renewal rates are rapid relative to consumption or patch revisitation rates, the effects of a feeding episode will be rapidly erased, and whatever form of patchiness characterized the system before the foraging will remain. If, on the other hand, renewal rates are relatively slow, patches suffering depletion will remain so for long periods, leading individuals to forage in previously unforaged areas. All patches will thus eventually be likely to suffer a similar degree of depletion, fostering increased spatial homogeneity in resource levels. — S. T. A. Pickett and P. S. White, eds., The Ecology of Natural Disturbance and…, 1228
Categorization
- corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — S. T. A. Pickett and P. S. White, eds., The Ecology of Natural Disturbance and…, 1228
- XREF: connects to: Richness is maintained when disturbance recurs faster than competitive exclusion — S. T. A. Pickett and P. S. White, eds., The Ecology of Natural Disturbance and…, 2251
Broader Connections
- Richness is maintained when disturbance recurs faster than competitive exclusion
#complicates(0.75) — S. T. A. Pickett and P. S. White, eds., The Ecology of Natural Disturbance and…, 2251