Enrichment scale determines herbivore control of primary producers

Gil, Michael A.; Jiao, Jing; Osenberg, Craig W.

doi:10.1007/s00442-015-3505-1

Cited by 12 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…Such demographic responses can act to compensate for enhanced productivity over broader spatial or temporal scales (Gil et al. ). Nevertheless, in some systems, population increases might lead to an overconsumption of primary production causing shifts in regime (Silliman et al.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Conversely, if individuals benefit from abiotic change (e.g., nutrient enrichment) and increase their fitness, these changes may result in growth of the size of consumer populations. Such demographic responses can act to compensate for enhanced productivity over broader spatial or temporal scales (Gil et al 2015). Nevertheless, in some systems, population increases might lead to an overconsumption of primary production causing shifts in regime (Silliman et al 2013).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Organismal homeostasis buffers the effects of abiotic change on community dynamics

Ghedini

Connell

2016

Ecology

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The problem of linking fine-scale processes to broad-scale patterns remains a central challenge of ecology. As rates of abiotic change intensify, there is a critical need to understand how individual responses aggregate to generate compensatory dynamics that stabilize community processes. Notably, while local and global resource enhancement (e.g., nutrient and CO release) can reverse dominance relationship between key species (e.g., shifts from naturally kelp-dominated to turf-dominated systems), herbivores can counter these shifts by consuming the additional productivity of competing species (e.g., turfs). Here, we test whether consumer plasticity in energy intake to maintain growth in varying environments can underpin changes in consumption that buffer varying levels of productivity. In response to carbon and nutrient enrichment, herbivores increased consumption of higher-quality food, which acted as a buffer against enhanced production, while maintaining organismal processes across varying abiotic conditions (i.e., growth). These results not only suggest plasticity in feeding behavior, but also in energy acquisition and utilization to maintain organismal processes. Such plasticity may not only underpin organismal homeostasis, but also compensatory dynamics that emerge from the aggregate of these responses to buffer change in community processes.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Organismal homeostasis buffers the effects of abiotic change on community dynamics

Ghedini

Connell

2016

Ecology

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“…As the size of such cages decreases, predation effects become increasingly driven by prey movement relative to prey vital rates, and can differ from true population effects (Englund, ). Similarly, effects of experimental herbivore exclusions on plants have been shown to be scale‐dependent (Gil, Jiao, & Osenberg, ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mammal‐induced trophic cascades in invertebrate food webs are modulated by grazing intensity in subalpine grassland

Vandegehuchte

Schütz

Schaetzen

et al. 2017

Journal of Animal Ecology

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Even though mammalian herbivores can exert strong indirect effects on other animals by altering the vegetation, the study of trophic cascades retains a focus on apex predators and their top-down forces. Bottom-up trophic interaction chains induced by mammalian herbivores, particularly in invertebrate food webs, remain largely unexplored. We tested whether effects of mammalian herbivores on the vegetation ricochet back up several trophic levels of the invertebrate food web. We further tested two alternative hypotheses: the strength of herbivore-induced indirect interactions either increases with plant productivity because of a concurrent higher grazing intensity, or it decreases because of a higher plant tolerance to grazing. We progressively excluded large, medium and small herbivorous mammals from replicated plots of 6 m in productive, intensively grazed short-grass vegetation and less productive, less intensively grazed tall-grass vegetation of subalpine grasslands. We measured vegetation quantity, quality, structure and composition, and determined the abundance of invertebrate herbivores, detritivores, omnivores and predators. We used structural equation modelling to test vegetation-mediated cascading effects of the different mammalian herbivores across different trophic groups of invertebrates. In the short-grass vegetation, mammals caused changes in vegetation quantity and thickness. These changes directly affected detritivorous and predatory invertebrate abundance, yet indirectly affected predatory and omnivorous invertebrates through a bottom-up trophic cascade via changes in herbivorous invertebrate abundance. In the tall-grass vegetation, mammal-induced changes in vegetation quality and composition affected detritivorous invertebrates and in turn omnivorous invertebrates, but these cascading effects were weaker than those in the short-grass vegetation. Smaller mammals were at least as important as large mammals in structuring the invertebrate food web. Our results demonstrate that differently sized mammalian herbivores can trigger trophic cascades in the local invertebrate food web. Our findings further support the hypothesis that herbivore-induced indirect interactions are stronger in more productive systems because of higher foraging intensity, as opposed to the hypothesis that a higher grazing tolerance of plants should dampen herbivore-induced indirect interactions in productive systems.

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“…Finally, the small spatial and temporal scale of our experiments does not allow us to draw a general conclusion from our experimental results on the possible top-down control of periphyton by nase in eutrophic rivers. Especially the effect of invertebrate grazing seems likely to be particularly strong on a small spatial scale but less relevant at larger scales ( Englund, 1997 ; Gil, Jiao & Osenberg, 2016 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Benthic grazing in a eutrophic river: cascading effects of zoobenthivorous fish mask direct effects of herbivorous fish

Gerke

Chaves

Richter

et al. 2018

PeerJ

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Benthic grazing strongly controls periphyton biomass. The question therefore arises whether benthic grazing could be used as a tool to reduce excessive growth of periphyton in nutrient-enriched rivers. Although benthic invertebrate grazers reduce the growth of periphyton, this is highly context dependent. Here we assessed whether the only obligate herbivorous fish in European rivers, the common nase (Chondrostoma nasus L.), is able to reduce periphyton biomass in a eutrophic river. We conducted three consecutive in situ experiments at low, intermediate and high densities of nase in the river using standard tiles on the river bottom naturally covered with periphyton that were accessible to fish and tiles that excluded fish foraging with electric exclosures. The biomass of benthic invertebrate grazers was very low relative to nase. We hypothesised that nase would reduce periphyton biomass on accessible tiles and therefore expected higher periphyton biomass on the exclosure tiles, at least at intermediate and high densities of nase in the river. Contrary to our expectation, the impact of fish grazing was low even at high fish density, as judged by the significantly lower chlorophyll a concentration on exclosure tiles even though the ash-free dry mass on accessible and exclosure tiles did not differ. The lower chlorophyll a concentrations on exclosure tiles might be explained by a higher biomass of invertebrate grazers on the exclosure tiles, which would indicate that the effect of invertebrate grazers was stronger than that of herbivorous fish grazers. The high biomass of invertebrate grazers on exclosure tiles likely arose from the exclusion of zoobenthivorous fish, which occur in the river at high densities. The results of our small-scale experiments suggested that cascading top-down effects of zoobenthivorous fish have a higher impact on periphyton biomass than direct effects of herbivorous nase.

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Enrichment scale determines herbivore control of primary producers

Cited by 12 publications

References 53 publications

Organismal homeostasis buffers the effects of abiotic change on community dynamics

Organismal homeostasis buffers the effects of abiotic change on community dynamics

Mammal‐induced trophic cascades in invertebrate food webs are modulated by grazing intensity in subalpine grassland

Benthic grazing in a eutrophic river: cascading effects of zoobenthivorous fish mask direct effects of herbivorous fish

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