Predator-prey cycles from resonant amplification of demographic stochasticity

Abstract

We present the simplest individual level model of predator-prey dynamics and show, via direct calculation, that it exhibits cycling behavior. The deterministic analogue of our model, recovered when the number of individuals is infinitely large, is the Volterra system (with density-dependent prey reproduction) which is well known to fail to predict cycles. This difference in behavior can be traced to a resonant amplification of demographic fluctuations which disappears only when the number of individuals is strictly infinite. Our results indicate that additional biological mechanisms, such as predator satiation, may not be necessary to explain observed predator-prey cycles in real (finite) populations.