Effects of joint invasion: How co-invaders affect each other's success in model food webs?

While there has been considerable research on the interactions between invasive and native species, and on the impact of invasive species on the resident community, there has been less focus on exploring the relationship and interactions among invasive species themselves. Nevertheless, it is widely recognised that invasive species can have either positive or negative effects on each other, as well as neutral outcomes. In the present theoretical study, we compared the success of two invasive non-native species in two scenarios: when they invaded the resident food web separately and simultaneously. We examined the correlations between their direct and indirect ecological relationships and their topological positions in the food web, with the varying outcomes of joint invasion. Using the Allometric Bioenergetic Model (ABM) for dynamic simulations, we determined the success of invasion (presence or absence of invaders) and, in the case of successful co-invasion, the direction of their biomass change, comparing separate and simultaneous invasion scenarios. We studied the relationships between these variables after detailed numerical simulations with variable key parameters of the model.