Eighteen years of field observations and five summer field experiments in a coastal California river suggest that hydrologic regimes influence algal blooms and the impacts of fish on algae, cyanobacteria, invertebrates, and small vertebrates. In this Mediterranean climate, rainy winters precede the biologically active summer low-flow season. Cladophora glomerata, the filamentous green alga that dominates primary producer biomass during summer, reaches peak biomass during late spring or early summer. Cladophora blooms are larger if floods during the preceding winter attained or exceeded ''bankfull discharge'' (sufficient to mobilize much of the river bed, estimated at 120 m 3 /s). In 9 out of 12 summers preceded by large bed-scouring floods, the average peak height of attached Cladophora turfs equaled or exceeded 50 cm. In five out of six years when flows remained below bankfull, Cladophora biomass peaked at lower levels. Flood effects on algae were partially mediated through impacts on consumers in food webs. In three experiments that followed scouring winter floods, juvenile steelhead (Oncorhynchus mykiss) and roach (Lavinia (Hesperoleucas) symmetricus) suppressed certain insects and young-of-the-year fish fry, affecting persistence or accrual of algae positively or negatively, depending on the predator-specific vulnerabilities of primary consumers capable of suppressing algae during a given year. During two post-flood years, these grazers were more vulnerable to small predators (odonates and fish fry, which stocked steelhead always suppressed) than to experimentally manipulated, larger fish, which had adverse effects on algae in those years. During one post-flood year, all enclosed grazers capable of suppressing algae were consumed by steelhead, which therefore had positive effects on algae. During drought years, when no bed-scouring winter flows occurred, large armored caddisflies (Dicosmoecus gilvipes) were more abundant during the subsequent summer. In drought-year experiments, stocked fish had little or no influence on algal standing crops, which increased only when Dicosmoecus were removed from enclosures. Flood scour, by suppressing invulnerable grazers, set the stage for fish mediated effects on algae in this river food web. Whether these effects were positive or negative depended on the predator-specific vulnerabilities of primary consumers that dominated during a given summer.

A multitrophic model integrating the effects of flooding disturbance and food web interactions in rivers predicted that removing floods would cause increases of predator-resistant grazing insects, which would divert energy away from the food chain leading to predatory fish. Experimental manipulations of predator-resistant grazers and top predators, and large-scale comparisons of regulated and unregulated rivers, verified the model predictions. Thus, multitrophic models can successfully synthesize a variety of ecological processes, and conservation programs may benefit by taking a food web perspective instead of concentrating on a single species.

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Marks, J. C., Power, M. E. and Parker, M. S. 2000. Flood disturbance, algal productivity, and interannual variation in food chain length. -Oikos 90: 20 -27.The length of a river food chain changed from year to year, shifting with the hydrologic regime. During drought years, grazers suppressed algae across a nutrient gradient, while predators were functionally unimportant. Following flood disturbance, predators suppressed grazers, releasing algae. These results suggest that hydrologic regime, rather than productivity, determines the functional length of this river food chain. Within years, algae and grazer biomass responded to an experimental productivity gradient in patterns predicted by simple trophic models that assume efficient energy transfer. Understanding differences among species within trophic levels, however, was crucial in delineating the controlling interactions.

Guinea-pig neuropeptide Y 1 and rat pancreatic polypeptide Y 4 receptors expressed in Chinese hamster ovary cells were internalized rapidly upon attachment of selective peptide agonists. The Y 1 and Y 2 , but not the Y 4 , receptor also internalized the nonselective neuropeptide Y receptor agonist, human/rat neuropeptide Y. The internalization of guinea-pig neuropeptide Y 2 receptor expressed in Chinese hamster ovary cells was small at 37 8C, and essentially absent at or below 15 8C, possibly in connection to the large molecular size of the receptor2ligand complexes (up to 400 kDa for the internalized fraction). The rate of intake was strongly temperature dependent, with essentially no internalization at 6 8C for any receptor.

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Midge larvae (Diptera, Chironomidae) that weave filamentous algae into retreats of tufts, are dominant primary consumers in a river food web. In a previous study, densities of tuft—weaving midges increased in the presence of large fish. In the absence of large fish, midges decreased as densities of predatory invertebrates built up, and higher standing crops of algae were maintained. To examine the mechanisms underlying these dynamics, we compared the vulnerability of tuft—weaving midges (naked or in algal tufts) to fish and predatory invertebrates, in field and laboratory experiments. When midges were exposed for 1 h in the river to fish, 15 out of 15 midges in tufts survived, while 15 of 15 naked midges were consumed. Tufts afforded only partial protection to midges exposed to invertebrate predators, however. After 1 h, enhancement of survivorship by tufts was moderately significant for midges exposed to aeshnids, and insignificant for midges exposed to lestids and naucorids. We suggest that the vulnerability of tuft—weaving midges to invertebrate predators, and their relative invulnerability to fish, sets the stage for trophic cascades observed in the system. Fish, by consuming small predators, release midges, which graze down algae. The strong effects of fish as fourth—level consumers would not be predicted from their diets, in which algivorous mayflies dominate (>60% of the insect biomass found in each of the two most common fish species). Nevertheless, fish in this food web act as fourth—level, rather than third—level, consumers because of the differential vulnerability of one guild of primary consumer, which, when released from predation, can suppress plants.