Fish and phytoplankton exhibit contrasting temporal species abundance patterns in a dynamic north temperate lake

Temporal patterns of species abundance, although less well-studied than spatial patterns, provide valuable insight to the processes governing community assembly. We compared temporal abundance distributions of two communities, phytoplankton and fish, in a north temperate lake. We used both 17 years...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2015-02, Vol.10 (2), p.e0115414-e0115414
Main Authors: Hansen, Gretchen J A, Carey, Cayelan C
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Abundance
Air
Animals
Communities
Community ecology
Computer simulation
Editors
Exhibitions
Fish
Fishes
Frequency distribution
Gloeotrichia echinulata
Hypotheses
Lakes
Life history
Limnology
Monte Carlo methods
Monte Carlo simulation
Phytoplankton
Population Dynamics
Prairies
Rare species
Relative abundance
Seasons
Time Factors
Tolerances
Wind
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Summary:Temporal patterns of species abundance, although less well-studied than spatial patterns, provide valuable insight to the processes governing community assembly. We compared temporal abundance distributions of two communities, phytoplankton and fish, in a north temperate lake. We used both 17 years of observed relative abundance data as well as resampled data from Monte Carlo simulations to account for the possible effects of non-detection of rare species. Similar to what has been found in other communities, phytoplankton and fish species that appeared more frequently were generally more abundant than rare species. However, neither community exhibited two distinct groups of "core" (common occurrence and high abundance) and "occasional" (rare occurrence and low abundance) species. Both observed and resampled data show that the phytoplankton community was dominated by occasional species appearing in only one year that exhibited large variation in their abundances, while the fish community was dominated by core species occurring in all 17 years at high abundances. We hypothesize that the life-history traits that enable phytoplankton to persist in highly dynamic environments may result in communities dominated by occasional species capable of reaching high abundances when conditions allow. Conversely, longer turnover times and broad environmental tolerances of fish may result in communities dominated by core species structured primarily by competitive interactions.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0115414