. The Canadian field-naturalist. 1994 Larter, Sinclair, and Gates: Response of Predators to Bison 319. Figure 1. The study area, Mackenzie Bison Sanctuary and adjacent area, Northwest Territories. The current range of Bison is denoted by the open diamonds. described in England where fox numbers were being maintained by rabbits at numbers high enough to significantly reduce breeding densities of Gray Partridge (Perdix perdix) (J. Reynolds, personal communication). Rock-wallaby (Petrogale lateralis) populations in Western Australia are being decimat- ed by fox predation (Kinnear et al. 1988), be
. The Canadian field-naturalist. 1994 Larter, Sinclair, and Gates: Response of Predators to Bison 319. Figure 1. The study area, Mackenzie Bison Sanctuary and adjacent area, Northwest Territories. The current range of Bison is denoted by the open diamonds. described in England where fox numbers were being maintained by rabbits at numbers high enough to significantly reduce breeding densities of Gray Partridge (Perdix perdix) (J. Reynolds, personal communication). Rock-wallaby (Petrogale lateralis) populations in Western Australia are being decimat- ed by fox predation (Kinnear et al. 1988), because fox numbers are being kept high by a substantial rabbit population. In some areas of western North America, Moose are the principal prey of Wolves which can remain at high enough population levels to deplete Caribou (Rangifer tarandus) populations. Seip (1992) docu- mented that a Woodland Caribou (R. t. caribou) pop- ulation spatially separated from Wolves and Moose during summer, and therefore less vulnerable to Wolf predation, had a lower adult mortality rate and higher calf survival than a similar Woodland Caribou population that was not spatially separated from Wolves and Moose. He believed that because the Wolf population was sustained primarily by Moose, the latter Caribou population could poten- tially be extirpated. We hypothesize that predators are capable of uti- lizing both Moose and Bison in this system, and that Wolf numbers have increased in response to increas- ing Bison numbers. We predict that over a range of Moose densities Wolves will continue to utilize Moose to a greater extent than expected given Moose and Bison availabilities, thus providing the potential for local extinctions of Moose populations. In this paper we examine Wolf-Bison-Moose dynamics in two areas by comparing Wolf diet, Wolf abundance, relative prey abundance and avail- able prey biomass to test whether Wolf predation on Moose, in the presence of Bison, can act in a desta- bilizing an
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