Abstract
Recently, Kohlmeier and Ebenhöh showed that cannibalism can stabilize population cycles in a Lotka-Volterra type predator-prey model. Population cycles in their model are due to the interaction between logistic population growth of the prey and a hyperbolic functional response. In this paper, we consider a predator-prey system where cyclic population fluctuations are due to the age structure in the predator species. It is shown that cannibalism is also a stabilizing mechanism when population oscillations are due to this age structure. We conclude that in predator-prey systems, cannibalism by predators can stabilize both externally generated (consumer-resource) as well as internally generated (agestructure) fluctuations.
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Van den Bosch, F., Gabriel, W. Cannibalism in an age-structured predator-prey system. Bltn Mathcal Biology 59, 551–567 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02459465
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02459465