A better argument than Paul Kropotkin’s
So did a pre-existing difference in prey allow their ranges to overlap without conflict, or did the overlap come first and the specialization on different prey follow as a result?
I don’t think you sre going to get a clear answer on that but I would say that part of being a good predator and surving as a species for any length of time probably means being proficient at navigating novel predator-predator relationships that arise locally all the time without creating unnecessary conflict.
The exact mechanism would be interesting. Like, do leopards have a specific instinct that amounts to “when snow leopards are around, leave the blue sheep to them”? Or do all predators have a more general instinct along the lines of “don’t hunt a given prey if some other predator hunts them more effectively than we do”?
The amount of different answers to this is probably dizzying, it is a wonderful question!
I prefer to answer it by pointing out that we assume predators are in a hostile relationship with their prey and other predators that access the same types of food. Of course in some ways this is true, in my opinion the definition of an “invasive species” is a species that is invisible to a local ecosystem’s pre-existing network of relationships between species and becomes hostile to the ecosystems continued dynamic equilibrium. However most of the time I don’t think this is necessarily a very productive perspective to take even though our subconscious continually does given the ways in which nature has been narrativized in the modern world.
I propose we consider predator-predator relationships the way plants naturally space pollination and fruiting to fill in gaps other species aren’t filling in terms of providing certain categories of important ecosystem players sustenance to make it to the next season in order to supercharge the productivity of the entire ecosystem and dynamically stabilize it.
Why do we assume to different species of predator that feed on the same prey and live in overlapping areas are truly in conflict? Sure conflict happens, but the point is when you zoom out I don’t personally see good evidence for the “evolutionary battle to the death” that popular nature descriptions (outside of indigenous explanations that feel far more honest) almost suffocatingly rely on to explain things.
I guess my point is, I wonder if an indigenous person who has lived their whole life learning about and interacting with ecosystems would be surprised by this? Probably to some degree, the science is beautiful but I think we don’t realize how culturally we are pressured into simplifying stories around violence and the quality of “uncivilized areas”.
Fascinating. Also makes me weary of modern humans, overpopulating the planet as we do, and even worse, directed upon our common goals in so many ways by beyond-toxic billionaires.
Bravo to these three species for hanging on and cooperating, as they do. ❤️
