Wind-Driven Carrying Capacity Shrinking Reshapes Species Competition: A Modified Lotka–Volterra Model with Wind-Sensitivity-Dependent Thresholds

Wind represents a pervasive yet mechanistically distinct environmental factor that reshapes species interactions primarily through habitat compression—reducing effective habitat area via behavioral avoidance, rather than altering resource availability as seen in temperature- or rainfall-driven models. This study introduces a a novel wind-modified Lotka–Volterra competition model that advances existing disturbance-dependent frameworks through two key innovations: (1) a wind-speed-dependent carrying capacity, formally expressed as the initial carrying capacity divided by a linear function of wind speed and species-specific wind sensitivity, which explicitly quantifies wind-induced habitat contraction as a nonlinear function of wind exposure; and (2) a species-specific wind sensitivity coefficient that can be experimentally calibrated. Through a rigorous stability analysis and numerical simulations, we demonstrate how wind speed modulates competitive outcomes by altering equilibrium densities and stability. Our results reveal: (a) wind can reverse competitive dominance, disproportionately excluding species with higher wind sensitivity coefficients; (b) critical wind speed thresholds exist, beyond which populations collapse due to mechanisms akin to Allee effects and demographic stochasticity; and (c) wind nonlinearly regulates coexistence, with moderate speeds sometimes stabilizing it and extreme speeds driving effective extinction. This framework provides a theoretical foundation for setting conservation thresholds and assessing the ecological impacts of wind energy projects.