ABSTRACT
The behavior of animals is often influenced by the environment in which they find themselves. Thus, a herd of horses may display a territorial organization in which watering holes are equi tably distributed and common, but may aban don territories where water sources are rare or unevenly spread (Franke-Stevens, 1987). An animal’s behavior can also alter its environ ment, as when responses to overcrowding lead to the colonization of new habitats (King, 1955). The field of behavioral ecology is con cerned with such problems, ones that entail at tention not merely to the physiological basis of behavior but also to its interaction with ecologi cal processes, and involves questions such as the following: Why don’t predators overeat their prey? How are food and space shared between species? Does behavior influence species diver sity? How are species kept distinct? How are communities organized? (Klopfer, 1962; Krebs &; Davies, 1978).
