Density of Key-Species Determines Efficiency of Macroalgae Detritus Uptake by Intertidal Benthic Communities.

ABSTRACT: Accumulating evidence shows that increased biodiversity has a positive effect on ecosystem functioning, but the mechanisms that underpin this positive relationship are contentious. Complete extinctions of regional species pools are comparatively rare whereas compositional changes and reductions in abundance and biomass are common, although seldom the focus of biodiversity-ecosystem functioning studies. We use natural, small-scale patchiness in the density of two species of large bivalves with contrasting feeding modes (the suspension-feeding Austrovenus stutchburyi and deposit-feeding Macomona liliana) to examine their influence on the uptake of nitrogen from macroalgae detritus (i.e. measure of ecosystem function and food web efficiency) by other infauna in a 10-d laboratory isotope-trace

SUBMITTER: Karlson AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4945087 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature