Patterns in size and species diversity of benthic macroinvertebrates in Mediterrannean salt marshes

Gascón, Stéphanie; Boix, Dani; Sala, Jordi; Quintana, Xavier D.

doi:10.3354/meps08151

Cited by 12 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…Nevertheless, the cited studies were mainly focused on planktonic organisms. In contrast, a previous study analyzing macroinvertebrate predation effect on the benthic community (Gascón et al 2009) found similar results to the ones reported in the current study. Another plausible explanation is that vegetation acts as a refuge for invertebrates against visual predators such as fish (Cook & Streams 1984).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

The effects of Aphanius iberus predation on an aquatic community: diel changes and the role of vegetation

Gascón¹,

Llopart²,

Ruiz‐Navarro³

et al. 2013

fal

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The predation effects of a cyprinodontid fish (Aphanius iberus) on the aquatic invertebrate community structure of a Mediterranean shallow system with vegetation were investigated. Field studies were performed in March and July of 2009 in a pond adjacent to the salterns of San Pedro del Pinatar (Murcia, Spain) to evaluate two distinct settings of A. iberus population dynamics. In March, the A. iberus population had a low density, mainly dominated by large fish, whereas in July, the population had a higher density, mainly dominated by small, young-ofthe-year fish. To analyse the fish, vegetation and possible diel effects on the invertebrate community, we compared the aquatic invertebrate body size distribution (biomass size spectra) found under the following conditions: 1) during different seasons with different fish population structures to include possible ontogenic shifts, 2) in vegetated and non-vegetated areas to include sites with different resource availability, and 3) under day and night conditions to investigate possible diel cycles. We hypothesise that 1) because the main predator (A. iberus) has a high preference for vegetated areas and is expected to show a reduced mobility out of these areas, no diel differences in the aquatic invertebrate community structure would be apparent; 2) differences in the aquatic invertebrate size spectra would be found when comparing the non-vegetated area to the vegetated area (an area with higher resource availability but also higher predation pressure); and 3) differences in the aquatic invertebrate size spectra would be apparent when comparing different seasons due to an ontogenic shift in the A. iberus diet. Our results showed that in the vegetated areas, where fish were much more abundant, the assemblages of aquatic invertebrates had a characteristic size spectrum, showing a higher size diversity and a higher total biomass than the assemblages observed in the non-vegetated areas. Moreover, the observed differences were not affected by diel changes because none of the analysed parameters showed significant differences between the day and night samplings.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

The effects of Aphanius iberus predation on an aquatic community: diel changes and the role of vegetation

Gascón¹,

Llopart²,

Ruiz‐Navarro³

et al. 2013

fal

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“…Ye et al (2013) also found a positive relationship between zooplankton size diversity and the zooplankton:phytoplankton biomass ratio. Other studies have reported size diversity to be positively related to nutrient scarcity in benthic invertebrate communities (Gascón et al 2009). Moreover, Emmrich et al (2011) found higher fish size diversity values in lakes with lower nutrient concentrations.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 93%

Predation and competition effects on the size diversity of aquatic communities

et al. 2014

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Body size has been widely recognised as a key factor determining community structure in ecosystems. We analysed size diversity patterns of phytoplankton, zooplankton and fish assemblages in 13 data sets from freshwater and marine sites with the aim to assess whether there is a general trend in the effect of predation and resource competition on body size distribution across a wide range of aquatic ecosystems. We used size diversity as a measure of the shape of size distribution. Size diversity was computed based on the Shannon-Wiener diversity expression, adapted to a continuous variable, i.e. as body size. Our results show that greater predation pressure was associated with reduced size diversity of prey at all trophic levels. In contrast, competition effects depended on the trophic level considered. At upper trophic levels (zooplankton and fish), size distributions were more diverse when potential resource availability was low, suggesting that competitive interactions for resources promote diversification of aquatic communities by size. This pattern was not found for phytoplankton size distributions where size diversity mostly increased with low zooplankton grazing and increasing nutrient availability. Relationships we found were weak, indicating that predation and competition are not the only determinants of size distribution. Our results suggest that predation pressure leads to accumulation of organisms in the less predated sizes, while resource competition tends to favour a wider size distributionhis work was supported by grants from the Comision de Investigacion Cientifica y Tecnica (CICYT), Programa de Investigacion Fundamental (CGL2008-05778/BOS and CGL2011-23907). We thank Dr. Dietmar Straile, who provided zooplankton data on Lake Constance. S. Brucet's contribution was supported by the Marie Curie Intra European Fellowship No. 330249 (CLIMBING

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“…Size diversity has been applied in the analysis of size-based organization of communities, including effects of predation on prey size distribution (Compte et al 2010(Compte et al , 2011(Compte et al , 2012Rudolf 2012;Ye et al 2013;Quintana et al 2015;Sorf et al 2015;Tavşano glu et al 2015), responses to environmental biotic or abiotic gradients at local or global scale (Badosa et al 2007;Gasc on et al 2009;Ruh ı et al 2009;Brucet et al 2010;Schartau et al 2010;Emmrich et al 2011;Arranz et al 2015;Benejam et al 2015) and seasonal dynamics or successional patterns after disturbances Paredes and Montecino 2011). Size-based approaches have also been used for the establishment of the ecological status in aquatic ecosystems (Gallardo et al 2011;Basset et al 2012).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Update: A non‐parametric method for the measurement of size diversity, with emphasis on data standardization. The measurement of the size evenness

Quintana

Egozcue

Martínez‐Abella

et al. 2016

Limnol. Oceanogr. Methods

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A method for the measurement of the size diversity based on the classical Shannon-Wiener expression was proposed as a proxy of the shape of the size distribution. The summatory of probabilities of a discrete variable (such as species relative abundances) in the original Shannon-Wiener expression was substituted by an integral of the probability density function of a continuous variable (such as body size). Here, we propose an update of this method by including the measurement of the size e-evenness, just dividing the exponential of the size diversity by its possible maximum for a given size range. Assuming a domain of the size range of (0,1), for a given logarithmic mean (m ln ) and a logarithmic standard deviation r ln ð Þ, the distribution with the highest diversity is the Log-Normal. The size e-evenness ranges between 0 and 1 because of the division by the maximum exponential diversity. Size e-evenness is useful to discriminate whether variations in size diversity are due to changes in the shape of the size distribution or caused by differences in size dispersion. Quintana et al. (2008) proposed a nonparametric method for the measurement of the size diversity as a proxy of the shape of the size distribution. Size diversity is computed on the basis of the Shannon-Wiener diversity expression (Pielou 1969) and adapted for continuous variables, such as size. The use of the size diversity for the analysis of the shape of a size distribution has several advantages (Quintana et al. 2008): (1) it integrates sizes of individuals and a size-density in the same way that Shannon-Wiener species diversity integrates the number of species and their relative abundance; (2) after data standardization, samples measured with different units, such as length, weight or volume, are comparable; and (3) its meaning is easy to interpret, since the concept of diversity is well established (Hurlbert 1971): a high size diversity means a wide size range and/or similar proportions of the different sizes along the size distribution. For the size diversity measurement the summatory of probabilities of discrete variables of the classical Shannon-Wiener expression (such as species relative abundances), is substituted by an integral involving the probability density function of the size X ð Þ of the individuals (p X x ð Þ) and takes the form

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Patterns in size and species diversity of benthic macroinvertebrates in Mediterrannean salt marshes

Cited by 12 publications

References 38 publications

The effects of Aphanius iberus predation on an aquatic community: diel changes and the role of vegetation

The effects of Aphanius iberus predation on an aquatic community: diel changes and the role of vegetation

Predation and competition effects on the size diversity of aquatic communities

Update: A non‐parametric method for the measurement of size diversity, with emphasis on data standardization. The measurement of the size evenness

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