Abundance, predation, and habitat associations of lemming winter nests in northern Sweden

Show simple item record

dc.contributor.author Vigues, Jan
dc.contributor.author Noren, Karin
dc.contributor.author Wilkinson, Caitlin
dc.contributor.author Stoessel, Marianne
dc.contributor.author Angerbjorn, Anders
dc.contributor.author Dalerum, Fredrik
dc.date.accessioned 2023-05-31T11:54:51Z
dc.date.available 2023-05-31T11:54:51Z
dc.date.issued 2022-06
dc.description.abstract Spatially synchronous fluctuations of animal populations have profound ecological consequences, especially in northern latitudes. Spatially coupled fluctuations are often seen in small rodent populations, albeit with local and regional variations. While both resource limitation and predation influence rodent dynamics, their relative importance for generating spatial variation is less clear, particularly during winter. In this study, we quantify spatial variation in winter abundance of the Norwegian lemming (Lemmus lemmus) across three ecologically connected mountain areas in northern Sweden and evaluate whether the relative strength of bottom-up and top-down regulation influences such variation. Our data included observations of predated and nonpredated winter nests as well as environmental characteristics of nest locations and nest predation. While the direction of annual changes in lemming nest abundance was perfectly synchronized among the three areas, there were differences in nest abundance, potentially caused by contrasting amplitudes of temporal fluctuations in lemming winter populations. Mustelid predation was positively associated with decreasing lemming populations but did not differ in occurrence among the three areas. Lemming nests were predominantly observed in meadows, whereas areas prone to flooding and close to the tree line were underrepresented. Mustelid predation was most common close to the tree line, but not associated with geomorphological characteristics related to snow depth. We suggest that the observed differences in lemming winter abundances were caused by variations in the relative strength of bottom-up and top-down regulation in the threemountain areas. We encourage further studies evaluating how the relative strength of different processes influence local population regulation, and how such processes influence spatial variation in animal population dynamics at different spatial scales. en_US
dc.description.department Mammal Research Institute en_US
dc.description.department Zoology and Entomology en_US
dc.description.librarian am2023 en_US
dc.description.sponsorship The Oscar and Lili Lamm Memorial Foundation, the Wildlife Management Fund by the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, WWF Sweden, Fjällräven International AB, and EU Interreg Felles Nord II. en_US
dc.description.uri https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/r/ecs2 en_US
dc.identifier.citation Vigués, Jan, Karin Norén, Caitlin Wilkinson, Marianne Stoessel, Anders Angerbjörn, and Fredrik Dalerum. 2022. “Abundance, Predation, and Habitat Associations of Lemming Winter Nests in Northern Sweden.” Ecosphere 13(6): e4140. https://DOI.org/10.1002/ecs2.4140. en_US
dc.identifier.issn 2150-8925 (online)
dc.identifier.other 10.1002/ecs2.4140
dc.identifier.uri http://hdl.handle.net/2263/90986
dc.language.iso en en_US
dc.publisher Wiley en_US
dc.rights © 2022 The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. en_US
dc.subject Microtine rodents en_US
dc.subject Norwegian lemming en_US
dc.subject Population cycles en_US
dc.subject Population synchrony en_US
dc.subject Spatial variation en_US
dc.title Abundance, predation, and habitat associations of lemming winter nests in northern Sweden en_US
dc.type Article en_US


Files in this item

This item appears in the following Collection(s)

Show simple item record