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Dispersal in stable habitats

Abstract

Simple mathematical models show that adaptations for achieving dispersal retain great importance even in uniform and predictable environments. A parent organism is expected to try to enter a high fraction of its propagules into competition for sites away from its own immediate locality even when mortality to such dispersing propagules is extremely high. The models incidentally provide a case where the evolutionarily stable dispersal strategy for individuals is suboptimal for the population as a whole.

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Hamilton, W., May, R. Dispersal in stable habitats. Nature 269, 578–581 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1038/269578a0

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