Interplay of competition and facilitation in grazing succession by migrant Serengeti herbivores.

Competition, facilitation, and predation offer alternative explanations for successional patterns of migratory herbivores. However, these interactions are difficult to measure, leaving uncertainty about the mechanisms underlying body-size-dependent grazing-and even whether succession occurs at all. We used data from an 8-year camera-trap survey, GPS-collared herbivores, and fecal DNA metabarcoding to analyze the timing, arrival order, and interactions among migratory grazers in Serengeti National Park.

Fear of the human "super predator" pervades the South African savanna.

Lions have long been perceived as Africa's, if not the world's, most fearsome terrestrial predator, the "king of beasts". Wildlife's fear of humans may, however, be far more powerful and all-prevailing as recent global surveys show that humans kill prey at much higher rates than other predators, due partly to technologies such as hunting with dogs or guns. We comprehensively experimentally tested whether wildlife's fear of humans exceeds even that of lions, by quantifying fear responses in the majority of carnivore and ungulate species (n = 19) inhabiting South Africa`s Greater Kruger National Park (GKNP), using automated camera-speaker systems at waterholes during the dry season that broadcast playbacks of humans, lions, hunting sounds (dogs, gunshots) or non-predator controls (birds).

Zooming in on mechanistic predator-prey ecology: Integrating camera traps with experimental methods to reveal the drivers of ecological interactions.

Camera trap technology has galvanized the study of predator-prey ecology in wild animal communities by expanding the scale and diversity of predator-prey interactions that can be analysed. While observational data from systematic camera arrays have informed inferences on the spatiotemporal outcomes of predator-prey interactions, the capacity for observational studies to identify mechanistic drivers of species interactions is limited. Experimental study designs that utilize camera traps uniquely allow for testing hypothesized mechanisms that drive predator and prey behaviour, incorporating environmental realism not possible in the laboratory while benefiting from the distinct capacity of camera traps to generate large datasets from multiple species with minimal observer interference.