Applicability of Dynamic Energy Budget (DEB) models across steep environmental gradients

Abstract

Robust ecological forecasting requires accurate predictions of physiological responses to environmental drivers. Energy budget models facilitate this by mechanistically linking biology to abiotic drivers, but are usually ground-truthed under relatively stable physical conditions, omitting temporal/spatial environmental variability. Dynamic Energy Budget (DEB) theory is a powerful framework capable of linking individual fitness to environmental drivers and we tested its ability to accommodate variability by examining model predictions across the rocky shore, a steep ecotone characterized by wide fluctuations in temperature and food availability. We parameterized DEB models for co-existing mid/high-shore (Mytilus galloprovincialis) and mid/low-shore (Perna perna) mussels on the south coast of South Africa. First, we assumed permanently submerged conditions, and then incorporated metabolic depression under low tide conditions, using detailed data of tidal cycles, body temperature and variability in food over 12 months at three sites. Models provided good estimates of shell length for both species across the shore, but predictions of gonadosomatic index were consistently lower than observed. Model disagreement could reflect the effects of details of biology and/or difficulties in capturing environmental variability, emphasising the need to incorporate both. Our approach provides guidelines for incorporating environmental variability and long-term change into mechanistic models to improve ecological predictions.

Projecting climate change impacts on Mediterranean finfish production: a case study in Greece

“…DEB-based models are able to capture changes in easily measurable variables such as weight and length explicitly as a function of temperature and food availability and, thus, can be used to study relevant biological responses in relation to shifts in environmental conditions. For this reason, their use in fish research is becoming increasingly popular with applications also in the field of climate research (Monaco and McQuaid 2018;Sara et al, 2018;Stavrakidis-Zachou et al 2019a;Talbot et al 2019). The feeding rate of an individual of a given size is proportional to a measure f of the food availability.…”

Predicting the performance of cosmopolitan species: dynamic energy budget model skill drops across large spatial scales

“…Here, we briefly refer to the fundamentals of the DEB model and the main components that allowed testing of the stationarity assumption. More detailed descriptions are given in Kooijman (2010), Sarà et al (2013), and Monaco and McQuaid (2018). We used a 'standard DEB model' (i.e.…”

Annelid polychaetes experience metabolic acceleration as other Lophotrochozoans: Inferences on the life cycle of Arenicola marina with a Dynamic Energy Budget model

“…Further experiments could be implemented on larvae in order to record physiological rates and estimate their Arrhenius temperature. Monaco and McQuaid (2018) highlighted the interest of adding to the temperature correction an aerial exposure term M d (linked to tidal height and the position of organisms on the shore) in foreshore habitats showing wide fluctuations in temperature and desiccation. Given the intense variations experienced by juvenile and adult lugworms ( Fig.…”