The influence of Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers on local insect community structure

摘要

Natural communities consist of irregular patchworks of organisms whose relative abundances both reflect and influence environmental heterogeneity (e.g., Diamond and Case 1986, Cornell and Lawton 1992). Within a given habitat, any species that augments environmental patchiness is likely to influence the abundances of sympatric species. For instance, through their unusual foraging strategy, Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers (Sphyrapicus varius) create rich resource patches in the form of sapwells, and may thereby affect population densities and spatial distributions of many co-occurring species.