Researchers from the Australian National University point out in the journal Biology Letters that medium-sized mammals could be more doomed to extinction than larger or smaller species , at least in areas where predators have been introduced.
Until now, the most widespread hypothesis among experts is that changes in environmental conditions affect the largest animals above all.
They need more food to survive and tend to have fewer young, so their numbers also grow more slowly. However, biologists Marcel Cardillo and Emily Hanna, from the Macroevolution and Macroecology Group of the aforementioned institution, point out that things change if the role played by predators is taken into account.
After studying 927 populations of 100 species of mammals spread over hundreds of islands around Australia, these scientists have found that the number of medium-sized specimens declined much faster than that of large ones if carnivores such as cats or foxes also inhabited the area. to those who served as prey.
On the contrary, the older ones disappeared earlier when there were no predators in the area . These, in addition, focused on capturing the halflings. In Cardillo and Hanna's opinion, these factors should be taken into account when guaranteeing the preservation of certain species, since now conservation efforts are mainly focused on large mammals.
