Inter-Research > MEPS > v221 > p209-219  
MEPS
Marine Ecology Progress Series

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MEPS 221:209-219 (2001)  -  doi:10.3354/meps221209

Zooplankton feeding ecology: grazing on phytoplankton and predation on protozoans by copepod and barnacle nauplii in Disko Bay, West Greenland

Jefferson T. Turner1,*, Henrik Levinsen2,**, Torkel Gissel Nielsen2, Benni Winding Hansen3

1School for Marine Science and Technology, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, 706 South Rodney French Boulevard, New Bedford, Massachusetts 02744, USA
2Department of Marine Ecology, National Environmental Research Institute, Frederiksborgvej 399, PO Box 358, 4000 Roskilde, Denmark
3Department of Life Sciences and Chemistry, Roskilde University, PO Box 260, 4000 Roskilde, Denmark
*E-mail: **Present address: Freshwater Biological Laboratory, University of Copenhagen, 51 Helsingørsgade, 3400 Hillerød, Denmark

ABSTRACT: Grazing experiments were conducted with Calanus spp. and Balanus cf. crenatus nauplii incubated with natural plankton from Disko Bay, West Greenland during the post-spring-bloom period. Both copepod and barnacle nauplii were feeding on different types of protists although at different rates. Calanus spp. nauplii preferred large ciliates and dinoflagellates whereas flagellates ~5 µm in diameter and Myrionecta rubra were hardly ingested at all. B. cf. crenatus nauplii preferred diatoms and also consumed the small flagellates at relatively high rates. Compared to Calanus spp. nauplii, B. cf. crenatus nauplii ingested ciliates and dinoflagellates at low rates suggesting a more herbivorous feeding mode than the more predaceous copepod nauplii. The daily grazing impact of the nauplii community in Disko Bay was estimated using the weight-specific mean clearances from the grazing experiments and field biomass values of different categories of prey and nauplii. These calculations showed that the grazing impact by the nauplii community on all prey categories was generally modest (1.3 to 9.2%). However, the dominant part of the total food intake by Calanus spp. nauplii in the surface water was composed of ciliates and dinoflagellates, most of which were phagotrophic


KEY WORDS: Nauplii · Copepod · Barnacle · Grazing · Predation · Arctic · Greenland


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