Coexistence of populations in a Leslie-Gower tritrophic model with Holling-type functional responses

Heliyon. 2024 Sep 24;10(19):e38207. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2024.e38207. eCollection 2024 Oct 15.

Abstract

The dynamics of a Leslie-Gower type tritrophic model are analyzed. The model considers the interaction among three populations, a resource, a predator and a superpredator. It is assumed that the predator is generalist and its interaction with the resource is according to a general Holling-type functional response. Furthermore, it is assumed that the superpredator is specialist and its interaction with the predator follows a Holling type II functional response. The goal of this work is to show conditions that guarantee the coexistence of the three species. To do this, the existence of a stable equilibrium point or a stable limit cycle is demonstrated, which appears via a bifurcation. In addition, the analytical results are exemplified through numerical simulations.

Keywords: 34C60; 37C75; 37G15; 92D25; Bautin bifurcation; Holling functional response; Hopf bifurcation; Leslie-Gower system; Tritrophic model.