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Effects of Spartina Wrack on Surface-Active Arthropod Assemblage Under Different Environmental Contexts in Southwest Atlantic Salt Marshes

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Abstract

Large amounts of tidally accumulated detritus (i.e., wrack) are an important source of disturbance affecting different abiotic and biotic characteristics in salt marshes, which could in turn affect the macrofauna assemblage. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the importance of wrack disturbance in Southwest Atlantic (SWA) salt marshes and its effects on the surface-active arthropod assemblage under different environmental contexts. By sampling the most important SWA salt marshes (from 36° 19′ S to 41° 01′ S), we found that wrack is a widespread disturbance in this region, present in all the salt marshes and periods sampled. However, the biomass and type of wrack (Spartina alterniflora vs. S. densiflora) vary according to the species that dominates each salt marsh. At two of these sites (Bahia Blanca (BB), 38° 59′ S and San Clemente (SC), 36° 19′ S), chosen because they represent the two salt marsh types in the SWA region (dominated by Spartina alterniflora or S. densiflora), we performed a field experiment by manipulating the presence and absence of wrack and conducting field samplings of sediment organic matter content and water content. We found that wrack affects surface arthropod assemblage but that this effect was not consistent for the different salt marshes: in BB, it changed the surface-active arthropod assemblage (shifted towards more detritivorous taxa) and increased the number of total individuals but had no effect on the number of species or diversity. At SC, wrack had no effect on any of the parameters evaluated. We suggest that the type of wrack in each salt marsh modulates the amount of organic matter content in the sediment: BB had wrack of better nutritional quality (dominated by S. alterniflora) and in turn had greater organic matter content in the sediment of wrack zones than in no-wrack zones, while in SC (dominated by S. densiflora), there is no differences between the two zones. We also suggest that depending on the original surface-active arthropod assemblage, those modifications will either favor (BB) or not favor (SC) wrack colonization by the surface-active arthropod assemblage. Moreover, considering that SWA wrack has different compositions and that the biomass differs among the different salt marshes, we expect wrack effects in the SWA, and probably in other regions, to be site-specific.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Mauricio Escapa and Betina Lomovasky for field assistance. This is part of D.M.’s doctoral thesis. Finally, we would like to thank two anonymous reviewers and the associate editor Charles T. Roman for valuable suggestions on the manuscript.

Funding

This project was supported by grants from the Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata, CONICET, and ANPCyT (all to O.I.) and D.M., M.A, M.V. by a grant from CONICET (Argentina).

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Author notes

  1. Macarena Valiñas

    Present address: Estación de Fotobiología Playa Unión, CC 15-(9103), Rawson, Chubut, Argentina

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Investigaciones Marinas y Costeras (IIMyC), CONICET, UNMDP, CC 1260 Correo Central, B7600WAG, Mar del Plata, Argentina

    Diana I. Montemayor, Alejandro D. Canepuccia, Mariana Addino, Macarena Valiñas & Oscar O. Iribarne

  2. Museo de Ciencias Naturales Lorenzo Scaglia, Área Entomología, Mar del Plata, Argentina

    Juan Farina

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  1. Diana I. Montemayor
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Correspondence to Diana I. Montemayor.

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Communicated by Charles T. Roman

Appendices

Appendix 1

Table 3 Linear mixed-effect model selection for relative abundance of plant species detritus and wrack biomass in San Clemente and Bahía Blanca. Number of parameters (N° pari), Akaike’s information criterion (AICi), Akaike differences (Δi), and normalized weights of AIC (wi). The best models are in italics
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Table 4 PERMANOVA results for macrofauna assemblage for the taxonomic level Order (1) and for the taxonomic level Species (2)
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Table 5 Linear mixed-effect model selection for the taxonomic level Order (1) and for the taxonomic level Species (2): S (number of taxa), N (number of individuals), and H (Shannon diversity index). Number of parameters (N° pari), Akaike's information criterion (AICi), Akaike differences (Δi), and normalized weights of AIC (wi). Z: zone; S: salt marsh; and S:Z: the interaction of those two factors. The best models are in italics
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Table 6 Water content and organic matter content generalized least squares (GLS) models with the structured variances and Akaike’s information criterion (AIC) values. The model with the variance in italics was the best one
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Appendix 2

Table 7 List of taxa for Order level
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Appendix 3

Table 8 List of taxa for Species level
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Montemayor, D.I., Canepuccia, A.D., Farina, J. et al. Effects of Spartina Wrack on Surface-Active Arthropod Assemblage Under Different Environmental Contexts in Southwest Atlantic Salt Marshes. Estuaries and Coasts 42, 1104–1126 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12237-018-00509-7

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