Mesopredator

Common card · No. 431539

A mesopredator is a predatory animal that occupies a mid-ranking trophic level in a food web, typically preying on smaller animals who are lower-level consumers, while itself being preyed upon by larger predators. There is no standard, concrete definition of a mesopredator, though mesopredators tend to be small to medium-sized carnivorous or omnivorous animals such as mustelids (e.g. otters, martens and weasels), canines (e.g. foxes and coyotes) or felines (e.g. cats, lynxes, ocelots and the cheetah), often defined by contrast from the apex predators of a particular food web. Mesopredators vary across different ecosystems. Sometimes, the same species is a mesopredator in one ecosystem but an apex predator in another ecosystem, depending on the biodiversity composition of the ecosystem and the presence of larger competitors. When new species are introduced into an ecosystem, the role of the mesopredator often changes; This can also happen if species are removed. Some mesopredators can quickly...

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