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Super-predator
An apex predator, also known as a top predator or superpredator, is a predator at the top of a food chain, without natural predators of its own. Apex predators are usually defined in terms of trophic dynamics, meaning that they occupy the highest trophic levels. Food chains are often far shorter on land, usually limited to being secondary consumers – for example, Gray wolf, wolves prey mostly upon large herbivores (primary consumers), which eat plants (primary producers). The apex predator concept is applied in wildlife management, conservation biology, conservation, and ecotourism. Apex predators have a long evolutionary history, dating at least to the Cambrian period when animals such as ''Anomalocaris'' and ''Timorebestia'' dominated the seas. Humans have for many centuries interacted with other apex predators including the wolf, Bird of prey, birds of prey, and cormorants to hunt game animals, birds, and fish respectively. More recently, humans have started interacting ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Predator
Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common List of feeding behaviours, feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill the Host (biology), host) and parasitoidism (which always does, eventually). It is distinct from Scavenger, scavenging on dead prey, though many predators also scavenge; it overlaps with Herbivore, herbivory, as Seed predation, seed predators and destructive frugivores are predators. Predation behavior varies significantly depending on the organism. Many predators, especially carnivores, have evolved distinct hunting strategy, hunting strategies. Pursuit predation involves the active search for and pursuit of prey, whilst ambush predation, ambush predators instead wait for prey to present an opportunity for capture, and often use stealth or aggressive mimicry. Other predators are opportunism, opportunistic or om ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Human
Humans (''Homo sapiens'') or modern humans are the most common and widespread species of primate, and the last surviving species of the genus ''Homo''. They are Hominidae, great apes characterized by their Prehistory of nakedness and clothing#Evolution of hairlessness, hairlessness, bipedality, bipedalism, and high Human intelligence, intelligence. Humans have large Human brain, brains, enabling more advanced cognitive skills that facilitate successful adaptation to varied environments, development of sophisticated tools, and formation of complex social structures and civilizations. Humans are Sociality, highly social, with individual humans tending to belong to a Level of analysis, multi-layered network of distinct social groups — from families and peer groups to corporations and State (polity), political states. As such, social interactions between humans have established a wide variety of Value theory, values, norm (sociology), social norms, languages, and traditions (co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mesopredator
A mesopredator is a predator that occupies a mid-ranking trophic level in a food web. There is no standard definition of a mesopredator, but mesopredators are usually medium-sized carnivorous or omnivorous animals, such as raccoons, foxes, or coyotes. They are often defined by contrast from apex predators or prey in a particular food web. Mesopredators typically prey on smaller animals. Mesopredators vary across different ecosystems. Sometimes, the same species is a mesopredator in one ecosystem and an apex predator in another ecosystem, depending on the composition of that ecosystem. When new species are introduced into an ecosystem, the role of the mesopredator often changes; this can also happen if species are removed. The American Institute of Biological Sciences states that due to the fact that mesopredators are smaller than large carnivores, they are more abundant, and therefore have greater diversity of mesopredator species. Due to their smaller size, mesopredators p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hedgehog
A hedgehog is a spiny mammal of the subfamily Erinaceinae, in the eulipotyphlan family Erinaceidae. There are 17 species of hedgehog in five genera found throughout parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa, and in New Zealand by introduction. There are no hedgehogs native to Australia and no living species native to the Americas. However, the extinct genus '' Amphechinus'' was once present in North America. Hedgehogs share distant ancestry with shrews (family Soricidae), with gymnures possibly being the intermediate link, and they have changed little over the last 15 million years. Like many of the first mammals, they have adapted to a nocturnal way of life. Their spiny protection resembles that of porcupines, which are rodents, and echidnas, a type of monotreme. Etymology The name ''hedgehog'' came into use around the year 1450, derived from the Middle English , from , , because it frequents hedgerows, and , , from its piglike snout. Other names that are used are ''urchin' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Badger
Badgers are medium-sized short-legged omnivores in the superfamily Musteloidea. Badgers are a polyphyletic rather than a natural taxonomic grouping, being united by their squat bodies and adaptions for fossorial activity rather than by their ancestral relationships: Musteloidea contains several families, only two of which (the "weasel family" Mustelidae and the "skunk family" Mephitidae) include badgers; moreover, both of these families also include various other animals that are not badgers. The fifteen species of mustelid badgers are grouped in four subfamilies: four species of Melinae (genera ''Meles'' and ''Arctonyx'') including the European badger, five species of Helictidinae (genus ''Melogale'') or ferret-badger, the honey badger or ratel Mellivorinae (genus ''Mellivora''), and the American badger Taxideinae (genus ''Taxidea''). Badgers include the most basal mustelids; the American badger is the most basal of all, followed successively by the ratel and the Mel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lake Trout
The lake trout (''Salvelinus namaycush'') is a freshwater Salvelinus, char living mainly in lakes in Northern North America. Other names for it include mackinaw, namaycush, lake char (or charr), touladi, togue, laker, and grey trout. In Lake Superior, it can also be variously known as siscowet, paperbelly and lean. The lake trout is prized both as a game fish and as a Fish as food, food fish. Those caught with dark coloration may be called ''mud hens''. Taxonomy and etymology It is the only member of the subgenus ''Cristovomer'', which is more derived than the subgenus ''Salvelinus#Taxonomy, Baione'' (the most Basal (phylogenetics), basal clade of ''Salvelinus'', containing the brook trout (''S. fontinalis'') and silver trout (''S. agasizii'')) but still basal to the other members of ''Salvelinus''. The binominal nomenclature, specific epithet ''namaycush'' derives from ''namekush'', a form of the word used in some inland Southern East Cree language, Southern East Cree commun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Smallmouth Bass
The smallmouth bass (''Micropterus dolomieu'') is a species of freshwater fish in the Centrarchidae, sunfish family (biology), family (Centrarchidae) of the order (biology), order Centrarchiformes. It is the type species of its genus ''Micropterus'' (black basses), and is a popular game fish sought by anglers throughout the temperate zones of North America, and has been spread by fish stocking, stocking —as well as illegal introduced species, introductions—to many cool-water tributaries and lakes in Canada and more so introduced in the United States. The maximum recorded size is approximately and . The smallmouth bass is native to the upper and middle Mississippi River basin, the Saint Lawrence River–Great Lakes system, the Champlain Valley, and the Hudson Bay basin. Its common names include smallmouth, bronzeback, brown bass, brownie, smallie, bronze bass, and bareback bass. Description Smallmouth have a slender but muscular fusiform body shape making them powerful ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Population Dynamics
Population dynamics is the type of mathematics used to model and study the size and age composition of populations as dynamical systems. Population dynamics is a branch of mathematical biology, and uses mathematical techniques such as differential equations to model behaviour. Population dynamics is also closely related to other mathematical biology fields such as epidemiology, and also uses techniques from evolutionary game theory in its modelling. History Population dynamics has traditionally been the dominant branch of mathematical biology, which has a history of more than 220 years,Malthus, Thomas Robert. An Essay on the Principle of Population: Library of Economics although over the last century the scope of mathematical biology has greatly expanded. The beginning of population dynamics is widely regarded as the work of Malthus, formulated as the Malthusian growth model. According to Malthus, assuming that the conditions (the environment) remain constant ('' ceteris pari ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Skua Runde
The skuas are a group of predatory seabirds with seven species forming the genus ''Stercorarius'', the only genus in the family Stercorariidae. The three smaller skuas, the Arctic skua, the long-tailed skua, and the pomarine skua, are called jaegers in North American English. The English word "skua" comes from the Faroese name for the great skua, , with the island of Skúvoy renowned for its colony of that bird. The general Faroese term for skuas is . The word "jaeger" or is German for "hunter". The genus name ''Stercorarius'' is Latin and means "of dung"; the food disgorged by other birds when pursued by skuas was once thought to be excrement. Skuas nest on the ground in temperate, Antarctic, and Arctic regions, and are long-distance migrants. They have even been sighted at the South Pole. Biology and habits Outside the breeding season, skuas take fish, offal, and carrion. Many practice kleptoparasitism, which comprises up to 95% of the feeding methods of winteri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iberian Lynx
The Iberian lynx (''Lynx pardinus'') is one of the four wikt:extant, extant species within ''Lynx'', a genus of medium-sized wild Felidae, cats. The Iberian lynx is endemic to the Iberian Peninsula in southwestern Europe. It is listed as vulnerable species, vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. In the 20th century, the Iberian lynx population had declined because of overhunting, poaching, Habitat fragmentation, fragmentation of suitable habitats, and the population decline of its main prey species, the European rabbit (''Oryctolagus cuniculus''), caused by myxomatosis and rabbit haemorrhagic disease. Fossils suggest the species has been present in Iberia since the end of the Early Pleistocene, around one million years ago. By the turn of the 21st century, the Iberian lynx was on the verge of extinction, as only 94 individuals survived in two isolated subpopulations in Andalusia in 2002. Conservation measures have been implemented since then, which included improving habitat, restockin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rewilding (conservation Biology)
Rewilding is a form of ecological restoration aimed at increasing biodiversity and restoring natural processes. It differs from other forms of ecological restoration in that rewilding aspires to reduce human influence on ecosystems. It is also distinct from other forms of restoration in that, while it places emphasis on recovering geographically specific sets of ecological interactions and functions that would have maintained ecosystems prior to human influence, rewilding is open to novel or emerging ecosystems which encompass new species and new interactions. A key feature of rewilding is its focus on replacing human interventions with natural processes. Rewilding enables the return of intact, large mammal assemblages, to promote the restoration of trophic networks. This mechanism of rewilding is a process of restoring natural processes by introducing or re-introducing large mammals to promote resilient, self-regulating, and self-sustaining ecosystems. Large mammals can influ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
