Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System.
The strength of top-down control by consumers is predicted to decrease with latitude, but most data confirming this assumption come from latitudes <60°, while empirical studies of predation in sub-arctic and arctic marine habitats are few. A barnacle Balanus crenatus is a native foundation specie...
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ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:4318ebd252264f6097fa9e1ad9c14b0a 2023-05-15T14:56:36+02:00 Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System. Eugeniy Yakovis Anna Artemieva 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0132973 https://doaj.org/article/4318ebd252264f6097fa9e1ad9c14b0a EN eng Public Library of Science (PLoS) http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4506121?pdf=render https://doaj.org/toc/1932-6203 1932-6203 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0132973 https://doaj.org/article/4318ebd252264f6097fa9e1ad9c14b0a PLoS ONE, Vol 10, Iss 7, p e0132973 (2015) Medicine R Science Q article 2015 ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0132973 2022-12-31T01:45:20Z The strength of top-down control by consumers is predicted to decrease with latitude, but most data confirming this assumption come from latitudes <60°, while empirical studies of predation in sub-arctic and arctic marine habitats are few. A barnacle Balanus crenatus is a native foundation species in the shallow subtidal of the White Sea (65° N), hosting a diverse (250+ species) assemblage of macrobenthic organisms. On mixed sediments live barnacles share primary substrates (shells and gravel) with numerous empty barnacle tests, 7% of which had drill holes of an unidentified origin. We manipulated the densities of (i) adult muricid whelks Boreotrophon clathratus (of previously unknown feeding habits), to check if they prey on barnacles, (ii) other predators to reveal their effect on juvenile Boreotrophon, and (iii) empty tests to assess the community-wide effect of predation on barnacles. The abundance of drilled empty tests in the field correlated with that of Boreotrophon. A year-long caging experiment clearly confirmed predation, showing the highest barnacle mortality and proportion of drilled tests in whelk enclosures, and the lowest--in predator exclosure treatments. Boreotrophon preferred the barnacles attached to conspecifics to those from primary substrates. Because of its scarcity Boreotrophon had a minor direct effect on barnacle abundance in the field. Yet, initially defaunated empty tests and live barnacles developed markedly different macrobenthic assemblages, suggesting a strong indirect effect of the predation. Juvenile Boreotrophon were 5-6 times less abundant in open and partial cages than in exclosures and enclosures, which indicates that the recruitment and, consequently, the abundance of Boreotrophon and its predation on Balanus are top-down controlled by apex predators. In contrast, in tropical and temperate intertidal the predation on barnacles is stronger and primarily limited by environmental stress and prey availability. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic White Sea Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Arctic White Sea PLOS ONE 10 7 e0132973 |
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Open Polar |
collection |
Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
op_collection_id |
ftdoajarticles |
language |
English |
topic |
Medicine R Science Q |
spellingShingle |
Medicine R Science Q Eugeniy Yakovis Anna Artemieva Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System. |
topic_facet |
Medicine R Science Q |
description |
The strength of top-down control by consumers is predicted to decrease with latitude, but most data confirming this assumption come from latitudes <60°, while empirical studies of predation in sub-arctic and arctic marine habitats are few. A barnacle Balanus crenatus is a native foundation species in the shallow subtidal of the White Sea (65° N), hosting a diverse (250+ species) assemblage of macrobenthic organisms. On mixed sediments live barnacles share primary substrates (shells and gravel) with numerous empty barnacle tests, 7% of which had drill holes of an unidentified origin. We manipulated the densities of (i) adult muricid whelks Boreotrophon clathratus (of previously unknown feeding habits), to check if they prey on barnacles, (ii) other predators to reveal their effect on juvenile Boreotrophon, and (iii) empty tests to assess the community-wide effect of predation on barnacles. The abundance of drilled empty tests in the field correlated with that of Boreotrophon. A year-long caging experiment clearly confirmed predation, showing the highest barnacle mortality and proportion of drilled tests in whelk enclosures, and the lowest--in predator exclosure treatments. Boreotrophon preferred the barnacles attached to conspecifics to those from primary substrates. Because of its scarcity Boreotrophon had a minor direct effect on barnacle abundance in the field. Yet, initially defaunated empty tests and live barnacles developed markedly different macrobenthic assemblages, suggesting a strong indirect effect of the predation. Juvenile Boreotrophon were 5-6 times less abundant in open and partial cages than in exclosures and enclosures, which indicates that the recruitment and, consequently, the abundance of Boreotrophon and its predation on Balanus are top-down controlled by apex predators. In contrast, in tropical and temperate intertidal the predation on barnacles is stronger and primarily limited by environmental stress and prey availability. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Eugeniy Yakovis Anna Artemieva |
author_facet |
Eugeniy Yakovis Anna Artemieva |
author_sort |
Eugeniy Yakovis |
title |
Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System. |
title_short |
Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System. |
title_full |
Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System. |
title_fullStr |
Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System. |
title_full_unstemmed |
Bored to Death: Community-Wide Effect of Predation on a Foundation Species in a Low-Disturbance Arctic Subtidal System. |
title_sort |
bored to death: community-wide effect of predation on a foundation species in a low-disturbance arctic subtidal system. |
publisher |
Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
publishDate |
2015 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0132973 https://doaj.org/article/4318ebd252264f6097fa9e1ad9c14b0a |
geographic |
Arctic White Sea |
geographic_facet |
Arctic White Sea |
genre |
Arctic White Sea |
genre_facet |
Arctic White Sea |
op_source |
PLoS ONE, Vol 10, Iss 7, p e0132973 (2015) |
op_relation |
http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4506121?pdf=render https://doaj.org/toc/1932-6203 1932-6203 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0132973 https://doaj.org/article/4318ebd252264f6097fa9e1ad9c14b0a |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0132973 |
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PLOS ONE |
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10 |
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7 |
container_start_page |
e0132973 |
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