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VIMS Articles

2008

Amphipods; biodiversity; complementarity; diversity; ecosystem function; grazers; herbivory; macroalgae

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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Relative And Interactive Effects Of Plant And Grazer Richness In A Benthic Marine Community, Jf Bruno, Ke Boyer, Je Duffy, Sc Lee Aug 2008

Relative And Interactive Effects Of Plant And Grazer Richness In A Benthic Marine Community, Jf Bruno, Ke Boyer, Je Duffy, Sc Lee

VIMS Articles

The interactive effects of changing biodiversity of consumers and their prey are poorly understood but are likely to be important under realistic scenarios of biodiversity loss and gain. We performed two factorial manipulations of macroalgal group (greens, reds, and browns) and herbivore species (amphipods, sea urchin, and fish) composition and richness in outdoor mesocosms simulating a subtidal, hard-substratum estuarine community in North Carolina, USA. In the experiment where grazer richness treatments were substitutive, there were no significant effects of algal or herbivore richness on final algal biomass. However, in the experiment in which grazer treatments were additive (i.e., species-specific densities …