Wolves, Moose, and the Allometry of Population Cycles
Peterson RO, Page RE, Dodge KM. 1984. Wolves, Moose, and the Allometry of Population Cycles. Science. 224(4655):1350-1352
After a decade of dramatic population fluctuations, protected populations of wolves and moose in Isle Royale National Park returned in 1983 to the levels observed in the 1950s. Inherent time lags in this predator-prey system and the strong recovery of the moose population following a wolf population crash suggest that these populations may continue to cycle with a period length of about 30 years. Such a long-term cycle is consistent with a recent hypothesis that period length of herbivore cycles will characteristically scale according to the fourth root of body mass, a basic allometric relationship linking physiological cycles to population processes.
- Type
- Journal Article
- Authors
- Peterson, Rolf; Page, Richard; Dodge, Kevin
- Units
- ISRO
- Keywords
- Animal Studies, Ecology, Gray Wolf (Canis lupus), Moose (Alces alces)