Magnitude of mesozooplankton variability: A case study from the Marginal Ice Zone of the Barents Sea in spring
Zooplankton was studied on eight stations in the marginal ice zone (MIZ) of the Barents Sea, in May 1999, along two transects across the ice edge. On each station physical background measurements and zooplankton samples were taken every 6 hours over a 24 hour period at five discrete depth intervals....
| Published in: | Journal of Plankton Research |
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
| Format: | Text |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Oxford University Press
2008
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://plankt.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/short/fbn002v1 https://doi.org/10.1093/plankt/fbn002 |
| Summary: | Zooplankton was studied on eight stations in the marginal ice zone (MIZ) of the Barents Sea, in May 1999, along two transects across the ice edge. On each station physical background measurements and zooplankton samples were taken every 6 hours over a 24 hour period at five discrete depth intervals. Cluster analysis revealed separation of open water stations from all ice stations as well as high similarity level among replicates belonging to particular station. Based on 5 replicates per station, analysis of variance (ANOVA) confirmed significant differences (p<0.05) in abundances of the main mesozooplankton taxa among stations. Relations between the zooplankton community and environmental parameters were established using RDA (CANOCO) analysis. In total, 55% of mesozooplankton variability within studied area was explained by 8 variables with significant conditional effects: depth stratum, fluorescence, temperature, salinity, bottom depth, latitude, bloom situation and ice concentration. GLM models supported supposition about clear and negative relationship between concentration of Oithona similis , and overall mesozooplankton diversity. The analyses showed a dynamic relationship between mesozooplankton distribution and hydrological conditions on short-term scale. Furthermore, our study demonstrated that variability in the physical environment of dynamic MIZ of the Barents Sea has measurable effect on the Arctic pelagic ecosystem. |
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