Prey Preferences for Three Aquatic Hemipterans Provide Insights About Their Coexistence

Abstract

We explored the potential of differences in foraging preferences to contribute to long-term species coexistence in aquatic predatory hemipterans. We hypothesized that predatory hemipterans would have distinct foraging preferences informed by their morphology. We used a prey choice experiment to test whether Belostoma flumineum, Pelocoris biimpressus, and Ranatra australis differed in their relative preferences of amphipod, damselfly naiad, and physid snail prey. We discovered that the predators showed complementarity in their foraging preferences with B. flumineum preferring snails, P. biimpressus damselfly naiads and R. australis amphipods as prey. Our results suggest that the disparate foraging preferences of aquatic hemipterans may facilitate their coexistence in aquatic systems but caution that studies need to explore whether patterns uncovered in the laboratory experiment reflect interactions in nature.