Social carnivores, such as wolves and coyotes, have distinct and well-defined home ranges.  During the formation of these home ranges scent marks provide important cues regarding the use of space by familiar and foreign packs. In this talk I will propose a set of mechanistic rules that can be used to understand the process of territorial pattern formation through interactions with scent marks. 

I will consider different model formulations, with and without the  den site as an organizing centre for spatial movement.  Under
realistic assumptions the resulting territorial patterns include  spontaneous formation of `buffer zones' between territories which act refuges for prey such as deer.  This is supported by detailed radiotracking studies.  The  model will also be
analysed using game theory, where the objective of each pack is to maximize its fitness by increasing intake of prey (deer) and by decreasing interactions with hostile neighboring packs.  Predictions will compared with radio tracking data for
wolves and coyotes.

Selected References:

Briscoe, B., Lewis, M.A, Parrish, S.: Home range formation in wolves due to scent marking.  Bull. Math. Biol. 64:261--284 (2002).

Lewis, M.A., Moorcroft, P.R.: ESS analysis of mechanistic home range
models: the value of signals in spatial resource partitioning. Journal of Theoretical Biology 210:449--461 (2001).

Moorcroft, P.R., Lewis, M.A., Crabtree R.:Home range analysis using a mechanistic home range model. Ecology 80: 1656--1665 (1999).

Lewis, M.A., White, K.A.J., Murray, J.D.:Analysis of a model for wolf territories
J. Math. Biol. 35: 749--774 (1997).

Lewis, M.A., Murray, J.D. Modelling territoriality and wolf-deer  interactions, Nature 366:738--740 (1993).