Macroscopic Dynamic Effects of Migrations in Patchy Predator-prey Systems

1997

Abstract Different mechanisms at the behaviourial or physiological levels determine many properties of predator-prey systems at the population level. In this paper, we present a method of obtaining complex predator-prey dynamic models from models at a detailed, behaviourial level of description. We consider a multi-patch predator-prey model, the dynamics of which contains two time-scales: a fast one, associated with migrations between patches, and a slow one, on which interactions, reproduction and mortality occur. We use methods of perturbation theory in order to aggregate the multi-patch system into a reduced system of two differential equations for the total prey and predator populations…