SLU news

Studying the prey of predators – which method should you use?

Published: 20 March 2017

A new review article provides researchers with tools to decide which method to use when identifying prey of invertebrate predators.

At the end of 2014, CBC financed Christer Björkman’s (from the Department of Ecology, SLU) pilot project on how predation pressure varies in time and space. The project started with a workshop in 2015 that has now resulted in an article on methods to identify the prey of invertebrate predators in terrestrial field studies.

A decision tree to decide on the best method

Predation is without doubt among the most important biotic interactions. When identifying prey in terrestrial systems, there are several different methods to choose from. In the article, the authors provide a decision tree to select the appropriate method for a specific study. Each method is presented with an introduction, examples for application and advantages and disadvantages.

The methods that are presented are, field observations, analysis of prey remains, cage studies (enclosures and exclosures), deployment of prey baits, molecular analyses, stable isotopes, and fatty acid analyses.

A combination of methods for more insights

– In many cases, individual methods are sufficient to study specific questions, but sometimes combinations of methods can provide more insights into the predation events. We hope that this review will be especially useful to researchers that are new to the field, says Mattias Jonsson, one of the researchers behind the study.


Contact

mattias.jonsson@slu.se, 018 - 67 2450