Swanepoel Lourens H, Somers Michael J, Dalerum Fredrik
Department of Zoology, University of Venda, Private bag X5050, Thohoyandou, 0950, South Africa; Centre for Wildlife Management, Hatfield Experimental Farm, University of Pretoria, Private bag X20, Pretoria, 0028, South Africa.
Department of Zoology, University of Venda, Private bag X5050, Thohoyandou, 0950, South Africa; Centre for Invasive Biology, University of Pretoria, Private bag X20, Pretoria, 0028, South Africa.
PLoS One. 2015 Apr 23;10(4):e0125539. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0125539. eCollection 2015.
Predation strategies in response to altering prey abundances can dramatically influence the demographic effects of predation. Despite this, predation strategies of humans are rarely incorporated into quantitative assessments of the demographic impacts of humans killing carnivores. This scarcity largely seems to be caused by a lack of data. In this study, we contrasted predation strategies exhibited by people involved in retaliatory killing and recreational sport hunting of leopards (Panthera pardus) in the Waterberg District Municipality, South Africa. We predicted a specialist predation strategy exemplified by a type II functional response for retaliatory killing, and a generalist strategy exemplified by a type III functional response for recreational sport hunting. We could not distinguish between a type I, a type II, or a type III functional response for retaliatory killing, but the most parsimonious model for recreational sport hunting corresponded to a type I functional response. Kill rates were consistently higher for retaliatory killing than for recreational sport hunting. Our results indicate that retaliatory killing of leopards may have severe demographic consequences for leopard populations, whereas the demographic consequences of recreational sport hunting likely are less dramatic.
应对猎物数量变化的捕食策略会极大地影响捕食的种群统计学效应。尽管如此，人类的捕食策略很少被纳入对人类捕杀食肉动物所产生的种群统计学影响的定量评估中。这种稀缺似乎主要是由数据缺乏导致的。在本研究中，我们对比了南非沃特贝格地区参与报复性捕杀和娱乐性猎捕豹（Panthera pardus）的人们所表现出的捕食策略。我们预测报复性捕杀以II型功能反应为代表的是一种特化捕食策略，而娱乐性猎捕以III型功能反应为代表的是一种泛化策略。对于报复性捕杀，我们无法区分I型、II型或III型功能反应，但娱乐性猎捕最简约的模型对应于I型功能反应。报复性捕杀的捕杀率始终高于娱乐性猎捕。我们的结果表明，报复性捕杀豹可能会对豹种群产生严重的种群统计学后果，而娱乐性猎捕的种群统计学后果可能没那么显著。
