I saw this display at the ROM, and was immediately drawn to it. The reason behind my interest in this particular symbiosis relationship between the arctic fox and the lemming was a simple one: I have a pet hamster that looks exactly like that poor lemming hanging from the mouth of its predator, the arctic fox. As it turned out, their predator-prey relationship is quite intriguing. They have what is called a boom and bust relationship, in which as the population of one species increases, the other decreases. Why is that? Imagine this: high in the Alps in the arctic, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse...except for LEMMINGS! The arctic fox has finally found its (main) food source, and so he heavily depends on this abundant food source of lemmings. Since the arctic foxes are presented with an abundance of food, they start to reproduce more. Uh oh, what does it mean for the lemmings? MORE ENEMIES! That's right, so now their lives are in more danger than ever, since there are enemy fire (arctic foxes) around every corner, hungry for food. They have nowhere to hide, so they make the ultimate sacrifice...into the digestive tract of those foxes. Now what, all (but some) lemmings have died, but there are so many arctic foxes waiting to be fed. That's right - as a result, they die off from starvation. So now the lemmings are happy, since there are less predators. Being the animals that they are, they take on this opportunity to reproduce more. And just like that, the cycle continues...
Yum.
