article · Science
Invasive big-headed ants disrupt an established mutualism between native ants and whistling-thorn trees, triggering wide-reaching ecological consequences across the landscape. Without protection from native ants, the dominant trees become susceptible to heavy browsing by elephants, which significantly opens up the vegetation and increases visibility. This habitat change directly affects hunting dynamics, making lions less effective at capturing plains zebras, their primary prey, in the cleared, invaded zones. Despite this reduction in hunting success on zebras, overall lion populations have not declined since the invasion began. Instead, lions appear to adapt by switching their predatory focus to African buffalo. Through this chain of ecological interactions, the introduction of a small invasive insect fundamentally alters the physical structure of the habitat and transforms predator-prey relationships among major wildlife species.
Biological invasions can trigger unexpected ripple effects across entire ecosystems. This research demonstrates how a tiny invasive ant can reshape an African savanna by compromising tree defences against elephants, altering the physical landscape, and forcing top predators like lions to adjust their hunting strategies. Understanding these complex ecological connections is crucial for managing wildlife reserves and addressing the broader impacts of invasive species.
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Mutualisms often define ecosystems, but they are susceptible to human activities. Combining experiments, animal tracking, and mortality investigations, we show that the invasive big-headed ant (<i>Pheidole megacephala</i>) makes lions (<i>Panthera leo</i>) less effective at killing their primary prey, plains zebra (<i>Equus quagga</i>). Big-headed ants disrupted the mutualism between native ants (<i>Crematogaster</i> spp.) and the dominant whistling-thorn tree (<i>Vachellia drepanolobium</i>), rendering trees vulnerable to elephant (<i>Loxodonta africana</i>) browsing and resulting in landscapes with higher visibility. Although zebra kills were significantly less likely to occur in higher-visibility, invaded areas, lion numbers did not decline since the onset of the invasion, likely because of prey-switching to African buffalo (<i>Syncerus caffer</i>). We show that by controlling biophysical structure across landscapes, a tiny invader reconfigured predator-prey dynamics among iconic species.
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DOI: 10.1126/science.adg1464
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