Seagrass wasting disease prevalence and lesion area increase with invertebrate grazing across the northeastern Pacific.

ABSTRACT: Disease is a key driver of community and ecosystem structure, especially when it strikes foundation species. In the widespread marine foundation species eelgrass (Zostera marina), outbreaks of wasting disease have caused large-scale meadow collapse in the past, and the causative pathogen, Labyrinthula zosterae, is commonly found in meadows globally. Research to date has mainly focused on abiotic environmental drivers of seagrass wasting disease, but there is strong evidence from other systems that biotic interactions such as herbivory can facilitate plant diseases. How biotic interactions influence seagrass wasting disease in the field is unknown but is potentially important for understanding dynamics of this globally valuable and declining habitat. Here, we investigated links between epif

SUBMITTER: Aoki LR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11754935 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature