Consumption threshold used to investigate stability and ecological dominance in consumer-resource dynamics

•We model herbivory driven population dynamics of a savannah using ordinary differential equations.•We introduce a consumption threshold that summarises some of the parameters.•This consumption number is used in investigating system stability and sensitivity to parameter fluctuations.•The consumption number is also used to identify degrees of ecological dominance.

Understanding consumer resource population dynamics can be important to an understanding of the overall ecology of systems. For example, the tree-grass continuum dynamics of savannas, an important ecological biome, is influenced by the population dynamics. Here we investigate herbivory driven population dynamics of a savanna using a simple model of the interactions of the dominant players, namely: trees, grasses, browsers, grazers and mixed browsers-grazers. We introduce a consumption threshold that summarises some of the parameters and this is used as a guide to understanding the dynamics. This number is used in investigating system stability and sensitivity to parameter fluctuations. It is also used to identify degrees of ecological dominance.