Recent models of food webs have shown that various foraging rules of thumb, and in fact traditional optimal foraging theory, can predict complexity and structure of large feeding networks. However, two major omissions from these models limit both their generality and applicability: herbivores tend not to be modeled, and a limited set of traits are explicitly considered. The first omission arises because predicting herbivore foraging links requires considering more feeding constraints than may exist in many predators. The second omission, while useful in focusing attention, for example on body size, restricts our understanding of how trait mediated effects (e.g. responses to environmental stress) impact food web structure and complexity.
Results/Conclusions
Here, we begin by accommodating herbivore optimal foraging into the Allometric Diet Breadth Model of food webs. In doing so, I facilitate a revised set of predictions of food web complexity and structure arising from optimal foraging. We then examine how variation in foraging traits, particularly those associated with prey handling time, help to illuminate the importance of trait responses to environmental change in food webs.
