Niche Relationships of a Guild of Necrophagous Flies1,2

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
An investigation into the niche relationships of flies which exploit carrion as a larval food resource was made. Four species of Calliphoridae, Phaenicia sericata (Meigen), Phormia regina (Meigen), Cochliomyia macellaria (F.) and Eucalliphora lilaea (Walker), and 2 species of Sarcophagidae, Blaesoxipha plinthopyga (Wiedemann) and Sarcophaga cooleyi Parker, were found to commonly breed on carrion in central California. Strategies of carcass exploitation along seasonal, successional, and size gradients were examined for each fly species. P. sericata and E. lilaea both occurred as pioneering species on smallsized carrion, but P. sericata fed on carrion during the warm season while E. lilaea was a cool season exploiter. P. sericata and P. regina exploited carrion contemporaneously during the spring season; however, P. regina fed during the later successional stages of decay primarily on large carrion. C. macellaria also preferred large carrion, but displaced P. regina by feeding during the fall season. Both B. plinthopyga and S. cooleyi specialized on small carrion during the summer and early fall when their ultrapioneering strategy of carcass attack reduced competitive interactions with the calliphorids. Species were found to diverge in their exploitation patterns of carrion, supporting the Gauseian contention that species with identical niche requirements cannot coexist. Each species was most fit (expressed heaviest average individual weight) on its most preferred resource state. The most stable resources were exploited by specialist species, while those species that fed on less stable aspects of the food resource were wide-niched in their exploitation strategy.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: