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Trophic diversity of idoteids (Crustacea, Isopoda) inhabiting the Posidonia oceanica litter

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Abstract

The coexistence of three idoteid species in Posidonia oceanica litter raises the question of trophic diversity and their role in the litter degradation process. Hence, diet composition of Idotea balthica, Idotea hectica and Cleantis prismatica was studied using a combination of gut contents and stable isotopes analysis. Gut content observations indicate that P. oceanica dead leaves are an important part of the ingested food for the three species, although their tissues are constituted of only a small to medium fraction of P. oceanica carbon. Our results also underlined the potential role of these species in the degradation of P. oceanica litter by mechanically fragmenting the litter and by assimilating a small to medium fraction of carbon. Moreover, we showed that there were considerable inter- and intra-specific differences in diet composition. Diet differed between juveniles and adults for I. balthica. Crustaceans are an important food source for adults of I. balthica, while I. hectica indicated a major contribution of algal material. C. prismatica showed an intermediate diet. This trophic diversity is probably one of the factors allowing these species to coexist in the same biotope.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the staff of the oceanographic research station STARESO (Calvi, Corsica) for valuable help during field work. We would like to thank A. L. Jackson, R. Inger and A. Parnell for their help in the isotopic model, and two anonymous referees for their helpful comments on the manuscript. We wish to thank Jacqueline Minett for improvement of the English. NS receives a doctoral grant from the Belgian Fund for Research for the Industry and Agriculture (FRIA), and GL is a Research Associate at the Belgian National Science Foundation (FRS-FNRS). This study was also funded by the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research (FRFC 2.45.69.03). This paper is MARE publication number 177. The authors declare that the experiments performed comply with the current laws of France and Belgium.

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  1. MARE Centre, Laboratoire d’Océanologie, Université de Liège, Sart Tilman B6, 4000, Liège, Belgium

    Nicolas Sturaro, Stéphane Caut, Sylvie Gobert, Jean-Marie Bouquegneau & Gilles Lepoint

  2. Estación Biológica de Doñana, Consejo Superior de Investigationes Científicas (CSIC), Apdo. 1056, 41080, Sevilla, Spain

    Stéphane Caut

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  1. Nicolas Sturaro
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Correspondence to Nicolas Sturaro.

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Communicated by U. Sommer.

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Sturaro, N., Caut, S., Gobert, S. et al. Trophic diversity of idoteids (Crustacea, Isopoda) inhabiting the Posidonia oceanica litter. Mar Biol 157, 237–247 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-009-1311-1

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