Sustainable strategies for harvesting predators and prey in a fluctuating environment

Edwige Bellier, Bernt-Erik Sæther and Steinar Engen

Ecological Modelling, 2021, vol. 440, issue C

Abstract: The effects of harvest and fluctuating environment on inter-dependent predators and prey are complex and not well-known. We define a stochastic model where the predators and prey dynamically interact. The novelty of the model holds on the fact that predators and prey dynamics are simultaneously affected by correlated environmental noises. Interacting predators and prey are harvested using a proportional threshold harvesting strategy that accounts for stochastic population dynamics. Optimal yield of prey can be obtained with identical harvesting strategies when the predators and prey responded to the environment similarly (i.e., synchrony between species) and differently (i.e., asynchrony between species). Remarkably, our study demonstrates that two different harvesting strategies, the proportional harvesting strategy for the prey and the proportional threshold harvesting strategy for the predators, are needed to optimize the annual yield of predators and prey when both species are harvested simultaneously. Our study finds optimal strategies for harvesting interacting species affected by environmental variations (i.e., correlated noises) with parameters representing the joint dynamics of predators and prey at a stable state.

Keywords: Correlated environmental noises; Optimal yield; Population dynamics; Population synchrony; Proportional threshold harvesting; Species interactions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304380020304166
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecomod:v:440:y:2021:i:c:s0304380020304166

DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2020.109350

Access Statistics for this article

Ecological Modelling is currently edited by Brian D. Fath

More articles in Ecological Modelling from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().