Avoiding Attack

Abstract The book discusses the diversity of mechanisms by which prey can avoid or survive attacks by predators, both from ecological and evolutionary perspectives. There is a particular focus on sensory mechanisms by which prey can avoid being detected, avoid being identified, signal (perhaps sometimes dishonestly) to predators that they are defended or unpalatable. The book is divided into three sections. The first considers detection avoidance through, for example, background matching, disruptive patterning, countershading and counterillumination, or transparency and reflective silvering. The second section considers avoiding or surviving an attack if detection and identification by the predator has already…