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Phenotypic plasticity is important because it allows an individual to adapt to a changing environment and can ultimately alter their evolutionary path. It not only plays an indirect role in defense as individuals prepare themselves physically to take on the task of avoiding predation through camouflage or developing collective mechanical traits ...
This naiveté towards non-native predators is likely influenced by eco-evolutionary factors such as biogeographic isolation and prey adaptation. [2] A prey species' ability to detect and evade predators can be shaped by the life history, ecology, and evolutionary context of both predator and prey.
Predators are adapted and often highly specialized for hunting, with acute senses such as vision, hearing, or smell. Many predatory animals, both vertebrate and invertebrate, have sharp claws or jaws to grip, kill, and cut up their prey. Other adaptations include stealth and aggressive mimicry that improve hunting efficiency.
Predators need not locate their host directly: Kestrels, for instance, are able to detect the faeces and urine of their prey (which reflect ultraviolet), allowing them to identify areas where there are large numbers of voles, for example. This adaptation is essential in prey detection, as voles are quick to hide from such predators.
All adaptations have a downside: horse legs are great for running on grass, but they cannot scratch their backs; mammals' hair helps temperature, but offers a niche for ectoparasites; the only flying penguins do is under water. Adaptations serving different functions may be mutually destructive. Compromise and makeshift occur widely, not ...
Organisms in above- and below-ground environments can interact indirectly through plants. Many studies have shown both the positive and negative effects that one organism in one environment can have on other organisms in the same or opposite environment, with the plant acting as the intermediary. [43] A mycorhizal association with a plant root
The green world hypothesis proposes that predators are the primary regulators of ecosystems: they are the reason the world is 'green', by regulating the herbivores that would otherwise consume all the greenery. [1] [2] It is also known as the HSS hypothesis, after Hairston, Smith and Slobodkin, the authors of the seminal paper on the subject. [3]
Aggressive mimicry often involves the predator employing signals which draw its potential prey towards it, a strategy which allows predators to simply sit and wait for prey to come to them. The promise of food or sex are most commonly used as lures. However, this need not be the case; as long as the predator's true identity is concealed, it may ...