Food quality and food threshold: implications of food stoichiometry to competitive ability of herbivore plankton

Iwabuchi, Tsubasa; Urabe, Jotaro

doi:10.1890/es12-00098.1

Cited by 17 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…This is consistent with the results of Iwabuchi and Urabe (2010), who demonstrated that small cladocerans such as Ceriodaphnia quadrangula can outcompete larger Daphnia pulex even in the absence of size-selective predation due to their greater ability to benefit from P-rich bacterial food. This is also consistent with the more recent finding by Iwabuchi and Urabe (2012) that the quality of food influences the competitive superiority of a herbivore zooplankton species in terms of threshold food levels. A possible spatial adaptation of Dc is its increased efficiency in retaining the smallest food particles on fine mesh size filters in warm, and hence less viscous (Abrusan 2004) subsurface water layers during the summer stratification.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Threat or treat: the role of fish exudates in the growth and life history of Daphnia

Maszczyk

Bartosiewicz

2012

Ecosphere

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Abstract. In kairomone studies, it is often implicitly assumed that the only effect of predator exudates on their prey is to trigger anti-predator defenses. However, chemicals originating from fish activity may also fertilize the environment and enhance the growth of zooplankton prey by increasing bacterial food availability. It is necessary to separate these two effects in order to examine the adaptive significance of zooplankton anti-predation defenses and the ability of the prey to benefit from fish-related food.Here, we have employed differential filtration of media to permit assessment of these two effects on growth rate and life history adjustments in two Daphnia species that differ in body size and the ability to collect small particles (greater in small-bodied D. cucullata than in larger D. hyalina). Filters of three mesh sizes were employed: 2 lm (most bacteria pass, but detritus is retained), 0.45 lm (standard) and 0.20 lm (most bacteria and detritus retained).The concentration of kairomones in the fish medium was assumed to be unaffected by filtration. However, the abundance of bacteria in the fish and no-fish media was dependent on the filter mesh size. This influenced the food level and its impact on Daphnia growth rate and life history. The effect of fishrelated bacterial food was greater under low than under high algal food conditions (0.1 and 1.0 mg C/L) and more significant in D. cucullata.Use of media with a diminished bacterial abundance revealed the effect of kairomones alone as (1) reduced growth rate, size at reproduction, number of pre-adult instars, age at maturation, level of the integrated egg and body lipids, egg volume, and (2) increased number of eggs per clutch vs. body length. These effects were equally strong in both species, despite differences in body size, and were greater at the higher algal food concentration. The findings of this study indicate the need to re-analyze and possibly revise the results of previous kairomone studies, especially those using media filtered through mesh sizes coarser than 0.2 lm that were performed under limiting algal food conditions or with species particularly able to benefit from bacterial food.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Threat or treat: the role of fish exudates in the growth and life history of Daphnia

Maszczyk

Bartosiewicz

2012

Ecosphere

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“…Variations C:N:P stoichiometry have been reported for microzooplankton (e.g., Meunier et al, 2012a;Grover and Chrzanowski, 2006) and for mesozooplankton (Urabe et al, 2002b;DeMott and Pape, 2005;Ferrao et al, 2007;Iwabuchi and Urabe, 2012b). Differences in elemental stoichiometry within or between the different trophic levels might help elucidate ecological interactions during food-web successions (Plath and Boersma, 2001;Sterner and Elser, 2002;Grover and Chrzanowski, 2006;Sterner et al, 2008;Meunier et al, 2012a,b;Litchman et al, 2013).…”

Section: Question 1: Does Phytoplankton Food Quality Shape the Microzmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Variable phytoplankton elemental composition is often presumed to propagate across trophic levels in the food chain (Mitra and Flynn, 2007;Malzahn et al, 2010;Iwabuchi and Urabe, 2012b;Meunier et al, 2012a). Stoichiometric plasticity in (meso-) zooplankton seems to be both narrower and more complex than in phytoplankton (Sterner and Elser, 2002;Urabe et al, 2002a,b;Iwabuchi and Urabe, 2012a,b;Suzuki-Ohno et al, 2012;Hessen et al, 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Microzooplankton Stoichiometric Plasticity Inferred from Modeling Mesocosm Experiments in the Peruvian Upwelling Region

Marki

Pahlow

2016

Front. Mar. Sci.

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Oxygen minimum zones (OMZs) are often characterized by nitrogen-to-phosphorus (N:P) ratios far lower than the canonical Redfield ratio. Whereas, the importance of variable stoichiometry in phytoplankton has long been recognized, variations in zooplankton stoichiometry have received much less attention. Here we combine observations from two shipboard mesocosm nutrient enrichment experiments with an optimality-based plankton ecosystem model, designed to elucidate the roles of different trophic levels and elemental stoichiometry. Pre-calibrated microzooplankton parameter sets represent foraging strategies of dinoflagellates and ciliates in our model. Our results suggest that remineralization is largely driven by omnivorous ciliates and dinoflagellates, and highlight the importance of intraguild predation. We hypothesize that microzooplankton respond to changes in food quality in terms of nitrogen-to-carbon (N:C) ratios, rather than nitrogen-to-phosphorus (N:P) ratios, by allowing variations in their phosphorus-to-carbon (P:C) ratio. Our results point toward an important biogeochemical role of flexible microzooplankton stoichiometry.

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“…Al tered stoichiometry of primary producers alters food quality for herbivores, which strongly influences trophic interactions and food web dynamics, constraining consumer grazing and growth rates, as well as nutrient recycling (e.g. Sterner & Elser 2002, Iwabuchi & Urabe 2012. ES has successfully been applied to explain consumer food uptake rate, assimilation and growth efficiency (Cross et al 2003, Fagan & Denno 2004, Frost et al 2006, competition between consumer species (Hall 2004, Loladze et al 2004 as well as the effects of consumers on prey nutrient composition (Daufresne & Loreau 2001, Hillebrand et al 2009b.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The functional role of planktonic mixotrophs in altering seston stoichiometry

Moorthi¹,

Ptáčník²,

Sanders³

et al. 2017

Aquat. Microb. Ecol.

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Mixotrophic protists are widespread and relevant primary producers and consumers in planktonic food webs. Given their dual mode of nutrition, mixotrophs face different constraints in allocating resources to cellular structures compared to strict photoautotrophs. However, little is known about their stoichiometric requirements and their flexibility in nutrient content and thus food quality, or how this affects consumer performance and nutrient recycling. In the present study, we tested for systematic differences in elemental composition between photoautotrophic and mixotrophic protists. We compiled intracellular nutrient ratios of mixotrophic and phototrophic species from culture experiments and from 2 lake surveys. Overall, both laboratory and field data indicated that mixotrophy has a stabilizing effect on the nutrient stoichiometry of primary producers under changing nutrient supply. In laboratory experiments, mixotrophs showed a lower variability in intracellular N:P ratios compared to strict phototrophs and were more stable in their elemental composition in response to a gradient of dissolved N:P availability. With increasing contributions of mixotrophic phytoplankton taxa to total lake phytoplankton, both the mean and variance in seston C:P ratios decreased, i.e. communities with higher proportion of mixotrophs overall exhibited more constrained seston stoichiometry. Our results show that mixotrophy may have direct implications for nutrient cycling and secondary production through regulation of seston stoichiometry, buffering stoichiometric constraints for herbivores and enabling a more stable secondary production compared to systems dominated by phototrophic specialists.

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Food quality and food threshold: implications of food stoichiometry to competitive ability of herbivore plankton

Cited by 17 publications

References 52 publications

Threat or treat: the role of fish exudates in the growth and life history of Daphnia

Threat or treat: the role of fish exudates in the growth and life history of Daphnia

Microzooplankton Stoichiometric Plasticity Inferred from Modeling Mesocosm Experiments in the Peruvian Upwelling Region

The functional role of planktonic mixotrophs in altering seston stoichiometry

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