Structured landscapes promote persistence by favouring prudent predators

Evolution can lead to unexpected results. One such case is adaptive decline where, for example, a predator evolves to over-exploit its prey, resulting in population decline and possibly extinction. Using simulation models we explore how the tendency for predators to evolve over-exploitation of prey in simple, well-mixed populations changes as more landscape structure is added. We find that as the landscape becomes more structured, either through increasing the number of interconnected patches or decreasing the connectivity between existing patches, the amount of adaptive decline seen in the predator population decreases. This means that as the landscape becomes more complex, predator populations do not decline as much while the rate of predation evolves. This is analogous the evolution of virulence and cooperation, where spatial structure facilitates lower virulence and higher cooperation, respectively.