The difference between a rock and a biological hard place: epibionts in the rocky intertidal

McGowan, Kerry L.; Iyengar, Erika V.

doi:10.1007/s00227-017-3131-z

Cited by 7 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…Several hosts have evolved chemical, physical, or other bio-mediated defence systems to protect themselves from epibiotic attachment 1,43,44 . Therefore, many adherent organisms are generalists that do not have epibiotic relations or host specificity 45 . In order for adherent organisms to acquire host specificity, they may need to provide positive or neutral effects for the host 46 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Citizen science via social media revealed conditions of symbiosis between a marine gastropod and an epibiotic alga

Kagawa

Uchida

Yamazaki

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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Environmental factors promote symbiosis, but its mechanism is not yet well understood. The alga Pseudocladophora conchopheria grows only on the shell of an intertidal gastropod Lunella correensis, and these species have a close symbiotic relationship which the alga reduces heat stress of the gastropod. In collaboration with general public, we investigated how environmental conditions alter the symbiotic interaction between the alga and the gastropod. Information about the habitats of each gastropod and images of shells was obtained from the Japanese and Korean coasts via social media. We constructed the hierarchical Bayesian model using the data. The results indicated that the proportion of shell area covered by P. conchopheria increased as the substrate size utilized by the gastropod increased. Meanwhile, temperature did not affect the proportion of P. conchopheria on the shell. These suggested that the alga provides no benefits for the gastropod on small substrates because gastropod can reduce the heat stress by diving into the small sediment. Further, the gastropod’s cost incurred by growing the alga on the shell seems to be low as the algae can grow even in cooler places where no benefits of heat resistance for gastropods. Different environments can yield variable conditions in symbiosis.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Citizen science via social media revealed conditions of symbiosis between a marine gastropod and an epibiotic alga

Kagawa

Uchida

Yamazaki

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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“…Alternatively, growing on snail shells may allow P. conchopheria to escape from predation by grazers. It is also possible that algae that grown on snail shells can escape desiccation through the mobility of the hosts (McGowan & Iyengar, ). Therefore, further studies are required to test these hypotheses.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Snails wearing green heatproof suits: the benefits of algae growing on the shells of an intertidal gastropod

Kagawa

Chiba

2018

Journal of Zoology

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Positive interactions are known to play important roles in ecological divergence but have received less attention than negative interactions in studies on intertidal communities. Here, we show that growth of the mat‐forming green alga Pseudocladophora conchopheria on the shells of a intertidal gastropod (Lunella coreensis) provides them with benefits for living in intertidal rocky habitats. We found that P. conchopheria covered a large proportion of the shell surface in all L. coreensis inhabiting an exposed rocky shore habitat, but none or only a small proportion of the shell surface in L. coreensis inhabiting a damp boulder shore habitat. Thermal exposure experiment showed that L. coreensis originating from the boulder shore habitat had a higher mortality rate and temperatures inside the shell than those originating from the exposed rocky shore habitat. These differences disappeared when P. conchopheria was removed from the shell or was dried out, indicating that an increased coverage and dampness of the alga suppressed the increase in temperature inside the shell. These support the hypothesis that the growth of P. conchopheria on L. coreensis shells suppresses thermal stress in the hosts; the benefits of P. conchopheria may enable the hosts to exploit habitats where considerable thermal stress is present during air exposure.

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“…The dynamics shown relate only to such communities, but these can be vitally important for understanding general ecological theory (Connell ). Particularly when small calcareous domiciles are counted as components of larger species assemblages, domicile abundances are commonly reported without information on whether any were dead and what the proportion may be (Clark et al , McGowan and Iyengar , Krzemińska and Kuklinski , Smith et al , Traiger and Konar , among other recent examples). The diagram shows the ecological processes (R = recruitment, M = mortality, T = taphonomic degradation) that may be considered to cause a hypothetical distributional pattern of differing density of domicile structures, depending on whether information is known about the status of occupancy.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The overlooked role of taphonomy in ecology: post‐mortem processes can outweigh recruitment effects on community functions

Liversage

Kotta

Fraser

et al. 2020

Oikos

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Biogenic structures that persist post‐mortem are ubiquitous, but rarely considered as key ecological features. Post‐mortem structures in many ecological systems exert community‐level effects and thus the dynamics of their degradation (i.e. taphonomy) become important in affecting community functions and ecosystem services, and these often‐overlooked effects may rival the influence of recruitment and typical post‐recruitment processes. Moreover, in some highly researched habitat types, post‐mortem structures may be mistaken for living organisms, thus introducing significant error into our understanding of population processes. We examined widespread patterns and processes in marine assemblages with calcareous tubeworms and brackish‐water assemblages with bryozoans, in order to test the importance of taphonomy for populations and communities. In tubeworm assemblages, taphonomic variability caused differential accumulation of post‐mortem structures, exerting community‐level influence, and importantly it negated effects from recruitment on the community functions. For tubeworms and bryozoans, proportions of post‐mortem structures varied between sheltered and exposed habitats with overall distributional variability being caused by the share of post‐mortem structures, not living animals. Population‐level inferences in such systems would be extremely problematic without careful differentiation of dead/living structures. Dynamics emerging from the interaction of taphonomic processes and recruitment ecology are relevant for many other important biogenic habitats, especially coral reefs with death assemblages of bleached corals; a failure to consider variability in processes acting on the death assemblages, alongside the living, may severely distort understanding of patterns and processes in populations and communities.

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The difference between a rock and a biological hard place: epibionts in the rocky intertidal

Cited by 7 publications

References 46 publications

Citizen science via social media revealed conditions of symbiosis between a marine gastropod and an epibiotic alga

Citizen science via social media revealed conditions of symbiosis between a marine gastropod and an epibiotic alga

Snails wearing green heatproof suits: the benefits of algae growing on the shells of an intertidal gastropod

The overlooked role of taphonomy in ecology: post‐mortem processes can outweigh recruitment effects on community functions

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