Trophic positioning of prominent copepods in the epi- and mesopelagic zone of the ultra-oligotrophic eastern Mediterranean Sea

Protopapa, Maria; Koppelmann, Rolf; Zervoudaki, Soultana; Wunsch, Carsten; Peters, Janna; Parinos, Constantine; Paraschos, Francesca; Gogou, Alexandra; Möllmann, Christian

doi:10.1016/j.dsr2.2019.04.011

Cited by 14 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 71 publications

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“…Particulate organic matter generally consists of a very heterogeneous and largely unknown mixture of particles and organisms within the water column. It may vary significantly in isotope ratios (e.g., Stowasser et al, 2012;Pakhomov et al, 2019;Protopapa et al, 2019), as also observed in our study. As a result of its heterogeneity, POM does not only represent TP 1 (primary producers), but may include different trophic positions (Pakhomov et al, 2019), also shown in our data by the higher δ 15 N values of POM compared to other organisms like salps or the copepod N. minor.…”

Section: Selection Of Food-web Components As Reference For Baselinesupporting

confidence: 84%

Toward a Solution of the “Peruvian Puzzle”: Pelagic Food-Web Structure and Trophic Interactions in the Northern Humboldt Current Upwelling System Off Peru

et al. 2022

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The northern Humboldt Current upwelling system (HCS) belongs to the most productive marine ecosystems, providing five to eight times higher fisheries landings per unit area than other coastal upwelling systems. To solve this “Peruvian puzzle”, to elucidate the pelagic food-web structure and to better understand trophic interactions in the HCS, a combined stable isotope and fatty acid trophic biomarker approach was adopted for key zooplankton taxa and higher trophic positions with an extensive spatial coverage from 8.5 to 16°S and a vertical range down to 1,000 m depth. A pronounced regional shift by up to ∼5‰ in the δ15N baseline of the food web occurred from North to South. Besides regional shifts, δ15N ratios of particulate organic matter (POM) also tended to increase with depth, with differences of up to 3.8‰ between surface waters and the oxygen minimum zone. In consequence, suspension-feeding zooplankton permanently residing at depth had up to ∼6‰ higher δ15N signals than surface-living species or diel vertical migrants. The comprehensive data set covered over 20 zooplankton taxa and indicated that three crustacean species usually are key in the zooplankton community, i.e., the copepods Calanus chilensis at the surface and Eucalanus inermis in the pronounced OMZ and the krill Euphausia mucronata, resulting in an overall low number of major trophic pathways toward anchovies. In addition, the semi-pelagic squat lobster Pleuroncodes monodon appears to play a key role in the benthic-pelagic coupling, as indicated by highest δ13C’ ratios of −14.7‰. If feeding on benthic resources and by diel vertical migration, they provide a unique pathway for returning carbon and energy from the seafloor to the epipelagic layer, increasing the food supply for pelagic fish. Overall, these mechanisms result in a very efficient food chain, channeling energy toward higher trophic positions and partially explaining the “Peruvian puzzle” of enormous fish production in the HCS.

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Section: Selection Of Food-web Components As Reference For Baselinesupporting

confidence: 84%

Toward a Solution of the “Peruvian Puzzle”: Pelagic Food-Web Structure and Trophic Interactions in the Northern Humboldt Current Upwelling System Off Peru

et al. 2022

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“…The λ represents the trophic level of the organism being used to set the baseline. Following Protopapa et al (2019), epipelagic POM was set as the baseline and λ was set to an intermediate value of 1.5, since it consists mostly of phytoplankton (TL = 1) and micro- and mesozooplankton (TL = 2) (Albo-Puigserver et al, 2016), equally contributing due to intensive top-down control in this region (Belkin et al, 2022).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…To date, much of the research describing the trophic ecology of the Eastern Mediterranean Sea (EMS) has focused on zooplankton groups (Koppelmann et al, 2003;Koppelmann et al, 2009;Hannides et al, 2015;Protopapa et al, 2019), shallow rocky reefs (Fanelli et al, 2015), and on anthropogenically-influenced coastal environments (Grossowicz et al, 2019), while less attention has been paid to deep-sea fishes and crustaceans that occupy higher trophic levels. Here we used bulk carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes (δ 13 C and δ 15 N) to study the trophic ecology of bathypelagic and bathybenthic fishes and crustaceans from the southeast Mediterranean continental slope and rise.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trophic ecology of deep-sea megafauna in the ultra-oligotrophic Southeastern Mediterranean Sea

Guy‐Haim

Stern

Sisma-Ventura

2022

Preprint

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The trophic ecology of fourteen species of bathybenthic and bathypelagic fishes and six species of bathybenthic decapod crustaceans from the continental slope and rise of the Southeastern Mediterranean Sea (SEMS) was examined using stable isotope analysis. Mean δ13C values among fish species varied by more than 4.0‰, from -20.85‰ (Macroramphosus scolopax) to -16.57‰ (Conger conger and Centrophorus granulosus), and increased as a function of depth (200 - 1400 m). Mean δ13C values of the crustaceans showed smaller variation, between -16.38‰ (Polycheles typhlops) and -18.50‰ (Aristeus antennatus). This suggests a shift from pelagic to regenerated benthic carbon sources with depth. Benthic carbon regeneration is further supported by the low benthic-pelagic POM-δ13C values, averaging -24.7 ± 1.2‰, and the mixing model results, presenting a very low contribution of epipelagic POM to the bathyal fauna. Mean δ15N values of fish and crustacean species ranged 7.91 ± 0.36‰ to 11.36 ± 0.39‰ and 6.15 ± 0.31‰ to 7.69 ± 0.37‰, respectively, resulting in trophic position estimates, occupying the third and the fourth trophic levels. Thus, despite the proximity to the more productive areas of the shallow shelf, low number of trophic levels (TL ≈ 1.0) and narrow isotopic niche breadths (SEAc <1) were observed for bathybenthic crustaceans (TL = 3.62 ± 0.22) and bathypelagic fishes (TL = 4.33 ± 0.34) in the study area — probably due to the ultra-oligotrophic state of the SEMS resulting in limited carbon sources. Our results, which provide the first trophic description of deep-sea megafauna in the SEMS, offer insight into the carbon sources and food web structure of deep-sea ecosystems in oligotrophic marginal seas and can be further used in ecological modeling and support the sustainable management of marine resources in the deep Levantine Sea.

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“…To date, much of the research describing the trophic ecology of the Eastern Mediterranean Sea has focused on zooplankton groups (Koppelmann et al, 2003;Koppelmann et al, 2009;Hannides et al, 2015;Protopapa et al, 2019), shallow rocky reefs (Fanelli et al, 2015), and on anthropogenically-influenced coastal environments (Grossowicz et al, 2019), while less attention has been paid to deep-sea fishes and crustaceans that occupy higher trophic levels. Here we used bulk carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes (δ 13 C and δ 15 N) of demersal and bathybenthic fishes and crustaceans from the southeast Mediterranean continental slope and rise.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trophic Ecology of Deep-Sea Megafauna in the Ultra-Oligotrophic Southeastern Mediterranean Sea

2022

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The trophic ecology of fourteen species of demersal fishes and six species of demersal decapod crustaceans from the continental slope and rise of the Southeastern Mediterranean Sea (SEMS) was examined using stable isotope analysis. Mean δ13C values among fish species varied by ca. 4.0‰, from -20.85‰ (Macroramphosus scolopax) to -16.57‰ and -16.89‰ (Conger conger and Centrophorus granulosus), showing an enrichment in 13C as a function of depth (200 – 1400 m). Mean δ13C values of the crustaceans showed smaller variation, between -18.54‰ (Aristeus antennatus) and -16.38‰ (Polycheles typhlops). This suggests a shift from pelagic to regenerated benthic carbon sources with depth. Benthic carbon regeneration is further supported by the low benthic-pelagic POM-δ13C values, averaging -24.7 ± 1.2‰, and the mixing model results, presenting relatively low contribution of epipelagic POM to the deep-sea fauna. Mean δ15N values of fish and crustacean species ranged 7.91 ± 0.36‰ to 11.36 ± 0.39‰ and 5.96 ± 0.24‰ to 7.73 ± 0.46‰, respectively, resulting in trophic position estimates, occupying the third and the fourth trophic levels. Thus, despite the proximity to the more productive areas of the shelf, low number of trophic levels (TL~1.0) and narrow isotopic niche breadths (SEAC<1) were observed for demersal crustaceans (TL = 2.94 ± 0.18) and fishes (TL = 3.62 ± 0.31) in the study area – probably due to the ultra-oligotrophic state of the SEMS resulting in limited carbon sources. Our results, which provide the first trophic description of deep-sea megafauna in the SEMS, offer insight into the carbon sources and food web structure of deep-sea ecosystems in oligotrophic marginal seas, and can be further used in ecological modeling and support the sustainable management of marine resources in the deep Levantine Sea.

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Trophic positioning of prominent copepods in the epi- and mesopelagic zone of the ultra-oligotrophic eastern Mediterranean Sea

Cited by 14 publications

References 71 publications

Toward a Solution of the “Peruvian Puzzle”: Pelagic Food-Web Structure and Trophic Interactions in the Northern Humboldt Current Upwelling System Off Peru

Toward a Solution of the “Peruvian Puzzle”: Pelagic Food-Web Structure and Trophic Interactions in the Northern Humboldt Current Upwelling System Off Peru

Trophic ecology of deep-sea megafauna in the ultra-oligotrophic Southeastern Mediterranean Sea

Trophic Ecology of Deep-Sea Megafauna in the Ultra-Oligotrophic Southeastern Mediterranean Sea

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