Hydrobiologia

, Volume 600, Issue 1, pp 139–146 | Cite as

Opposing diel migration of fish and zooplankton in the littoral zone of a large lake

  • Andreas Lorke
  • Arnd Weber
  • Hilmar Hofmann
  • Frank Peeters
Primary research paper
First Online:
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:

Abstract

Backscatter data from an acoustic Doppler current profiler are analyzed to provide simultaneous estimates of relative concentration of Daphnia and relative abundance of young-of-the-year perch in the vicinity of an artificial reef in the littoral zone of Lake Constance. These long-term (3 months) and high-resolution (1 h) observations demonstrate the existence of opposing diel migration patterns in fish and zooplankton. According to the data, the migration pattern constrains feeding of young-of-the-year fish on vertically migrating zooplankton to a few hours around sunrise and sunset. Temperature recorded simultaneously with the backscatter signal indicates that the diurnal activity pattern and the vertical distribution of the fish are not affected by strong temperature fluctuations generated by high-frequency internal wave motions. The abrupt decline of internal wave activity following a storm-induced deepening of the surface mixed layer, however, seems to be a trigger for changes in the diurnal activity and hence the intensity of predator–prey interactions.

Keywords

Vertical migration Acoustic backscatter Zooplankton Fish 
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Notes

Acknowledgments

We thank B. Rosenberg, J. Halder and the scientific diving team at the Limnological Institute of the University of Konstanz for their great help in the field. D. Straile kindly provided the zooplankton data. This study was financially supported by the German Research Foundation (grant LO 1150/2-2 to AL and within the Collaborative Research Center 454: The littoral zone of Lake Constance).

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2007

Authors and Affiliations

  • Andreas Lorke
    • 1
  • Arnd Weber
    • 1
  • Hilmar Hofmann
    • 1
  • Frank Peeters
    • 1
  1. 1.Limnological InstituteUniversity of KonstanzKonstanzGermany

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