Species Diversity: A Comment on the Role of the Predator

Abstract

Predators have been delegated an active role in determining the number of species in their ecological systems. This paper explored one possible influence of predators on their prey which would correlate with species diversity: the regulation of prey density, and the consequent regulation of the distribution of space among the different prey species. A hypothesis has been presented as an explicit statement, and suggestions have been made for estimating the parameters of the statement. The limitations of the hypothesis were explored, and it was concluded that, although the predators can be considered to provide space for the additional species of more diverse systems, supplementary factors must be invoked to explain the existence of the resources which support these additional species.