Competition from exotic red deer

 

 

 

 

-This assumption has not been supported by any data.

 

-Impact on vegetation occurs, but cannot be separated from impact from other native and exotic

large herbivores. Especially domestic livestock occurs in all these areas, and often at higher

biomass.

 

-Red deer only rarely occur where last huemul populations have survived.

 

-A study on huemul diet concluded that there was high trophic overlap with red deer diet.

However, the latter was determined in another habitat where the major food item that supposedly

overlapped was absent. Most huemul populations are occurring together with livestock, not with

red deer.

 

-A study concluding that exotic prey including red deer increased density of predators resulting in

increased predation of huemul (apparent competition) was not supported by cited studies which

actually showed the opposite. Moreover, the study ignored data that high-density puma could not

prevent guanaco from increasing >13-fold, and that huemul were expanding into these sites. Not

only are both studies opposite to the conclusions in the review, but neither had studied huemul

nor predator population trends.

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