Foraging success

Foraging success of granivorous rodents effects of variation in seed and soil water on olfaction. Ecology 79,223-241. 

Zimmer, R. K., Commins, J. E., and Browne, K. A., Regulatory effects of environmental chemical signals on search behavior and foraging success, Ecology, 80, 1432, 1999. 

Plankton patchiness is widely acknowledged as a ubiquitous and key feature of marine ecosystems (Martin 2003). Many organisms have been shown to exploit patches of food (e.g., Tiselius 1992), and patch formation may be important in the foraging success of many marine invertebrates (Seuront et al. 2001) and vertebrates (Cartamil and Lowe 2004), as well as for the sexual encounters among individuals of relatively rare species (Buskey 1998). While the quantification of the spatial and temporal structure of phytoplankton distributions has for the most part focussed on empirical observations at scales greater... 

Figure 4.4 Valence relativistic s-shell contraction (/ )r/(/ )nr (4s for Cu, 5s forAg, SsforAu and 7s for Fr). Here the ns-shell remains singly occupied and the x-axis gives the total number of electrons N with additional electrons filled in successively from the inner shells. For example N = 3 for Au describes the occupation ls 6s and N — 11 the occupation ls 2s 2p 6s ...

Centimeters (insects from different locations within cornfield canopy carry different residues) Seconds (interval between successive foraging choices)... 

Recently, metapopulation models have been successfully applied to assess the risks of contaminants to aquatic populations. A metapopulation model to extrapolate responses of the aquatic isopod Asellus aquaticus as observed in insecticide-stressed mesocosms to assess its recovery potential in drainage ditches, streams, and ponds is provided by van den Brink et al. (2007). They estimated realistic pyrethroid concentrations in these different types of aquatic ecosystems by means of exposure models used in the European legislation procedure for pesticides. It appeared that the rate of recovery of Asellus in pyrethroid-stressed drainage ditches was faster in the field than in the isolated mesocosms. However, the rate of recovery in drainage ditches was calculated to be lower than that in streams and ponds (van den Brink et al. 2007). In another study, the effects of flounder foraging behavior and habitat preferences on exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls in sediments were assessed by Linkov et al. (2002) using a tractable individual-based metapopulation model. In this study, the use of a spatially and temporally explicit model reduced the estimate of risk by an order of magnitude as compared with a nonspatial model (Linkov et al. 2002). 

The option to produce a home mix feed has appeal but the reality is different. So much of the health of any animal depends on the quality, quantity and nutritional balance of the feed that the days of scattering a handful of wheat, organic or not, and allowing the bird to forage for the remainder of its diet have gone. There will always be those who say that they achieve success by this means, but our belief is it is far better to purchase feed from a registered organic feed supplier than to mix a home produced feed. A compounded feed contains a mix of raw materials with documented and traceable supply routes, and a mineral-vitamin balance that will ensure the health of the chickens. 

---