Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-hc48f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T17:15:21.641Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Non-indigenous amphipods and mysids in coastal food webs of eastern Baltic Sea estuaries

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 June 2016

Nadezhda A. Berezina ,
Arturas Razinkovas-Baziukas  and
Alexei V. Tiunov
Nadezhda A. Berezina*
Affiliation:
Zoological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, Universitetskaya emb. 1, St.-Petersburg 199034, Russia
Arturas Razinkovas-Baziukas
Affiliation:
Coastal Research and Planning Institute, Klaipeda University, Herkaus Manto str. 84, Klaipėda 92294, Lithuania
Alexei V. Tiunov
Affiliation:
A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Russian Academy of Sciences, 33 Leninsky pr. Moscow 119071, Russia
*
Correspondence should be addressed to:N. A. Berezina, Zoological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, Universitetskaya emb. 1, St.-Petersburg 199034, Russia email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The study analyses the role of non-indigenous invertebrates in the food webs of two eutrophic brackish estuarine ecosystems of the Baltic Sea: the Neva River estuary and the Curonian Lagoon, with the aim of clarifying several questions such as what trophic levels were occupied by newly established species (mainly amphipods and mysids) and whether they can affect the native benthic invertebrates as a result of their possible carnivorous nature. Stable isotope analysis (δ15N values) and gut contents analysis of field-collected specimens were used to estimate trophic level and trophic links of the newly established malacostracan crustaceans, while their consumption rates when feeding as carnivores were measured experimentally. The δ15N analysis allocated four trophic levels (TL) in the coastal food webs of both studied ecosystems with the lowest δ15N (2–4‰) for detritus and algae and the highest for fish (12–14‰). Through their high abundance, non-indigenous crustaceans (Pontogammarus robustoides, Gmelinoides fasciatus, Obessogammarus crassus, Gammarus tigrinus, Limnomysis benedeni and Paramysis lacustris) have become important members of food chains of the studied ecosystems. Their trophic position varied significantly within species during ontogenesis. This suggests that they turned from being typically detritivores/plantivorous (TL 2–2.4) at juvenile stages to omnivores (2.5–3) or to carnivores (>3) as adults. Assessment of the predation pressure by the adult amphipods on other coexisting invertebrates (in the example of the Neva Estuary) showed a low or medium impact, depending on species of predator and productivity of its potential prey organisms.

Keywords

macrofaunatrophic levelnon-indigenous speciespredationNeva EstuaryCuronian Lagoon
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom , Volume 97 , Special Issue 3: European Marine Biology Symposium , May 2017 , pp. 581 - 590
Copyright
Copyright © Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Ahlbeck, I., Hansson, S. and Hjerne, O. (2012) Evaluating fish diet analysis methods by individual-based modeling. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 69, 1184–1201.Google Scholar
Arbaciauskas, K. (2008) Amphipods of the Nemunas River and the Curonian Lagoon, the Baltic Sea basin: where and which native freshwater amphipods persist? Acta Zoologica Lituanica 18, 10–16.Google Scholar
Arbaciauskas, K., Lesutiene, J. and Gasiunaite, Z.R. (2013) Feeding strategies and elemental composition in Ponto-Caspian peracaridans from contrasting environments: can stoichiometric plasticity promote invasion success? Freshwater Biology 58, 1052–1068.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bacela-Spychalska, K. and Van der Velde, G. (2013) There is more than one ‘killer shrimp’: trophic positions and predatory abilities of invasive amphipods of Ponto-Caspian origin. Freshwater Biology 58, 730–741.Google Scholar
Berezina, N.A. (2007a) Invasions of alien amphipods (Crustacea: Amphipoda) in aquatic ecosystems of North-Western Russia: pathways and consequences. Hydrobiologia 590, 15–29.Google Scholar
Berezina, N.A. (2007b) Food spectra and consumption rates of four amphipod species from the North-West of Russia. Fundamental and Applied Limnology /Archiv für Hydrobiologie 168, 317–326.Google Scholar
Berezina, N.A. (2008) Assessment of predation impact by invasive amphipods in easternmost Baltic Sea. Neobiota 7, 211–218.Google Scholar
Berezina, N., Golubkov, S. and Gubelit, J. (2005) Grazing effects of alien amphipods on macroalgae in the littoral zone of the Neva Estuary (eastern Gulf of Finland, Baltic Sea). Oceanological and Hydrobiological Studies 34, 63–82.Google Scholar
Berezina, N.A., Petryashev, V.V., Razinkovas, A. and Lesutiene, J. (2011) Alien malacostraca in the eastern Baltic Sea: pathways and consequences. In Galil, B.S., Clark, P.F. and Carlton, J.T. (eds) In the wrong place – alien marine crustaceans: distribution, biology and impacts. Dordrecht: Springer, pp. 301–322.Google Scholar
Bollache, L., Dick, J.T.A., Farnsworth, K.D. and Montgomery, W.I. (2008) Comparison of the functional responses of invasive and native amphipods. Biology Letters 4, 166–169.Google Scholar
Bresciani, M., Giardino, C., Stroppiana, D., Pilkaitytė, R., Zilius, M., Bartoli, M. and Razinkovas, A. (2012) Retrospective analysis of spatial and temporal variability of chlorophyll-a in the Curonian Lagoon. Journal of Coastal Conservation 16, 511–519.Google Scholar
Cruz-Rivera, E. and Hay, M.E. (2001) Macroalgal traits and the feeding and fitness of a herbivorous amphipod: the roles of selectivity, mixing, and compensation. Marine Ecology Progress Series 218, 249–266.Google Scholar
Daunys, D. and Zettler, M.L. (2006) Invasion of the North American amphipod (Gammarus tigrinus Sexton, 1939) into the Curonian Lagoon, south-eastern Baltic Sea. Acta Zoologica Lituanica 16, 20–26.Google Scholar
Devin, S., Bollache, L., Noël, P.Y. and Beisel, J.N. (2005) Patterns of biological invasions in French freshwater systems by non-indigenous macroinvertebrates. Hydrobiologia 551, 137–146.Google Scholar
Dick, J.T.A., Jonson, M.P., McCambridge, S., Johnson, J., Carson, V.E.E., Kelly, D.W. and MacNeil, C. (2005) Predatory nature of the littoral amphipod Echinogammarus marinus: gut content analysis and effects of alternative food and substrate heterogeneity. Marine Ecology Progress Series 291, 151–158.Google Scholar
Dick, J.T.A. and Platvoet, D. (1996) Intraguild predation and species exclusions in amphipods: the interaction of behavior, physiology and environment. Freshwater Biology 36, 375–383.Google Scholar
Dick, J.T.A., Platvoet, D. and Kelly, D.W. (2002) Predatory impact of the freshwater invader Dikerogammarus villosus (Crustacea: Amphipoda). Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences 59, 1078–1084.Google Scholar
Fink, P., Kottsieper, A., Heynen, M. and Borcherding, J. (2012) Selective zooplanktivory of an invasive Ponto-Caspian mysid and possible consequences for the zooplankton community structure of invaded habitats. Aquatic Sciences 74, 191–202.Google Scholar
Fry, B. (1983) Fish and shrimp migrations in the northern Gulf of Mexico analyzed using stable C, N and S isotope ratios. Fishery Bulletin 81, 789–801.Google Scholar
Gasiunas, I.I. (1972) Obogaschenie kormovoj bazy ryb vodoemov Litvy akklimatizirovannymi rakoobraznymi Kaspijskogo kompleksa [Enrichment of feeding base for fish of water bodies of Lithuania by acclimatized crustaceans from the Caspian Sea complex]. In Voprosy razvedenija ryb i rakoobraznykh v vodoemakh Litvy In Virbitskas, J. (ed.) Voprosy razvedeniya ryb i rakoobraznykh v vodoemakh Litvy. Vilnius: Publishing House Mintis, pp. 57–68. [In Russian]Google Scholar
Golubkov, S.M. (2000) Functional ecology of insect larvae. Saint-Petersburg: Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences Publ. 295 pp. [In Russian]Google Scholar
Golubkov, M.S. (2009) Phytoplankton primary production in the Neva Estuary at the turn of the 21st century. Inland Water Biology 2, 312–318.Google Scholar
Gubelit, J.I. and Berezina, N.A. (2010) The causes and consequences of algal blooms: the Cladophora glomerata bloom and the Neva estuary (eastern Baltic Sea). Marine Pollution Bulletin 61, 183–188.Google Scholar
Hyslop, E.J. (1980) Stomach contents analysis – a review of methods and their application. Journal of Fish Biology 17, 411–429.Google Scholar
Jankauskiene, R. (2003) Selective feeding of Ponto-Caspian higher crustaceans and fish larvae in the littoral zone of the Curonian Lagoon. Ekologija 2, 19–27. [In Lithuanian]Google Scholar
Jennings, S., Pinnegar, J.K., Polunin, N.V.C. and Warr, K.J. (2002) Linking size-based and trophic analyses of benthic community structure. Marine Ecology Progress Series 22, 77–85.Google Scholar
Kelly, D.W., Bailey, R.J., MacNeil, C., Dick, J.T.A. and McDonald, R.A. (2006) Invasion by the amphipod Gammarus pulex alters community, composition of native freshwater macroinvertebrates. Diversity and Distributions 12, 525–534.Google Scholar
Kelly, D.W. and Dick, J.T.A., (2005) Effects of environment and an introduced invertebrate species on the structure of benthic macroinvertebrate species at the catchment level. Archiv für Hydrobiologie 164, 69–88.Google Scholar
Lauringson, V. and Kotta, J. (2006) Influence of the thin drift algal mats on the distribution of macrozoobenthos in Koiguste Bay, NE Baltic Sea. Hydrobiologia 554, 97–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lesutiene, J. (2009) Food web of the Curonian Lagoon: organic matter sources and feeding of mysids. Doctoral thesis. Klaipeda University, Klaipeda.Google Scholar
Lesutiene, J., Gorokhova, E., Gasiunaite, Z.R. and Razinkovas, R. (2007) Isotopic evidence for zooplankton as an important food source for the mysid Paramysis lacustris in the Curonian Lagoon, the South-Eastern Baltic Sea. Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science 73, 73–80.Google Scholar
MacNeil, C., Dick, J.T.A. and Elwood, R.W. (1997) The trophic ecology of freshwater Gammarus spp. (Crustacea: Amphipoda): problems and perspectives concerning the functional feeding group concept. Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society 72, 349–364.Google Scholar
MacNeil, C., Elwood, R.W. and Dick, J.T.A. (1999) Predator-prey interactions between brown trout Salmo trutta and native and introduced amphipods: their implications for fish diets. Ecography 22, 686–696.Google Scholar
McGlathery, K.J., Sundback, K. and Anderson, I.C. (2007) Eutrophication in shallow coastal bays and lagoons: the role of plants in the coastal filter. Marine Ecology Progress Series 348, 1–18.Google Scholar
Michener, R. and Lajtha, K. (2007) Stable isotopes in ecology and environmental science, 2nd edition. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Peterson, B.J. and Fry, B. (1987) Stable isotopes in ecosystem studies. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 18, 293–320.Google Scholar
Pilkaityte, R. and Razinkovas, A. (2006) Factors controlling phytoplankton blooms in a temperate estuary: nutrient limitation and physical forcing. Hydrobiologia 555, 41–48.Google Scholar
Post, D. (2002) Using stable isotopes to estimate trophic position: models, methods, and assumptions. Ecology 83, 703–718.Google Scholar
Schiewer, U. (2008) Ecology of Baltic coastal waters. Ecological Studies 197. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.Google Scholar
Urbakh, V.Y. (1964) Biometric methods. Moscow: Nauka, 415 pp. [In Russian]Google Scholar
Zilius, M., Bartoli, M., Daunys, D., Pilkaityte, R. and Razinkovas, A. (2012) Patterns of benthic oxygen uptake in a hypertrophic lagoon: spatial variability and controlling factors. Hydrobiologia 699, 85–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar