The Competitive exclusion – tolerance rule explains habitat partitioning among co-occurring species of burying beetles

Habitat partitioning among co-occurring, ecologically similar species is widespread in nature and thought to be an important mechanism for coexistence. The factors that cause habitat partitioning, however, are unknown for most species. We experimentally tested among three alternative hypotheses to explain habitat partitioning among two species of co-occurring burying beetle (Nicrophorus) that occupy forest (N. orbicollis) and wetland (N. hebes) habitats. Captive experiments revealed that the larger N. orbicollis (forest) was consistently dominant to N. hebes (wetland) in competitive interactions for carcasses that they require for reproduction. Transplant enclosure experiments in nature revealed that N. hebes had poor reproductive success whenever the dominant N. orbicollis was present. In the absence of N. orbicollis, N. hebes performed as well, or better, in forest versus its typical wetland habitat. In contrast, N. orbicollis performed poorly in wetlands regardless of the presence of..., , , # Data from: The Competitive exclusion – tolerance rule explains habitat partitioning among co-occurring species of burying beetles [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.4f4qrfjgx](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.4f4qrfjgx) ## Description of the data and file structure See Readme.txt file. Version 2 published on 11 Oct 2023 includes updated R code. ## Code/Software See R code file.