Complexity to order: impact of antipedator behaviour on chaotic and non-chaotic intraguild predation model

Abstract

Food-webs consisting of three or more species exhibit very complex dynamics in ecosystems which mainly depend on the various traits of prey and predator. In presence of predator, prey adopted optimal strategies to avoid predation and to increase their survival. The antipedator behaviour exhibited by prey against predator’s fear; have potential to change the qualitative dynamics of food web systems. In the present study, we demonstrate the impacts of simultaneous fears exerted by two predators bidirectionally in a simple tri-trophic intraguild-predation (IGP) food-web model when IGP has point stability and chaotic dynamical states in absence of fear. The antipredator behaviour exhibited by prey against the fear of predators lead chaotic system into point stability and enhances coexistence. We carried out general mathematical phenomenon such as equilibrium analysis, stability and persistence. We also verified the stability by Routh Hurwitz criteria. By one and two parameter bifurcation diagram, we concluded that fear enhances stability. Our numerical simulations reveal that fear of mesopredator stabilize the system while top predator fear has dampening ability of chaos.