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Shelter availability reduces the effects of the invasive Red Swamp Crayfish (Procambarus clarkii) on eelgrass-dominated clear-water lakes: a mesocosm approach

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Abstract

Shelter availability is one of the key features governing crayfish habitat quality. It can directly influence crayfish’s individual survival of by lowering the risk of predation, but the ecosystem-wide impacts of sheltering on water quality are largely unknown. To test the effects of shelter availability for Procambarus clarkii in clear-water macrophyte-dominated lakes, we performed a 24-day mesocosm experiment in 20 tanks (4 with one crayfish with and without shelters, 4 with two crayfish with and without shelters and 4 controls). The bottom of each tank was almost completely covered by the eelgrass Vallisneria denseserrulata. Compared with the treatments with shelters, more broken leaves occurred in the treatments without shelters at both crayfish densities at equivalent crayfish numbers, and total phosphorus was higher in the treatments without shelters. Total suspended solids and total nitrogen concentrations were higher in the treatments with two crayfish without shelters than in those with shelters, whilst these variables did not differ between treatments in the mesocosms with one crayfish only. Our results suggest that shelter availability reduces the activity of crayfish (e.g. movement and burrowing) and agonistic behaviour, thereby decreasing the negative effect of the invasive P. clarkii on water quality in V. denseserrulata-dominated clear-water lakes.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Anne Mette Poulsen and EditSprings for language assistance. This study was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Hubei Province (2020CFB537), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 32170383), key scientific research project funding from the Hubei Provincial Water Resources Bureau (HBSLKY202014) and preliminary hydraulic research and consulting work of Hubei Water Resources Research Institute (P21800600002). EJ was supported by AQUACOSMplus (Network of Leading European AQUAtic MesoCOSM Facilities Connecting Mountains to Oceans from the Arctic to the Mediterranean), AnaEE Denmark (anaee.dk) and the TÜBITAK program BIDEB 2232 (project 118C250).

Funding

Jian Gao was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Hubei Province (2020CFB537), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 32170383), key scientific research project funding from the Hubei Provincial Water Resources Bureau (HBSLKY202014) and preliminary hydraulic research and consulting work of Hubei Water Resources Research Institute (P21800600002). Erik Jeppesen was supported by AQUACOSMplus (Network of Leading European AQUAtic MesoCOSM Facilities Connecting Mountains to Oceans from the Arctic to the Mediterranean), AnaEE Denmark (anaee.dk) and the TÜBITAK program BIDEB 2232 (project 118C250).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Hubei Province Key Laboratory of Ecological Restoration of Lakes and Rivers and Algal Utilization, Innovation Demonstration Base of Ecological Environment Geotechnical and Ecological Restoration of Rivers and Lakes, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, 430068, People’s Republic of China

    Jian Gao, Shengnan Hu & Cheng Yang

  2. State Key Laboratory of Lake Science and Environment, Nanjing Institute of Geography & Limnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, 210008, China

    Zhengwen Liu

  3. Sino-Danish Centre for Education and Research, Beijing, China

    Zhengwen Liu & Erik Jeppesen

  4. Department of Ecoscience, Aarhus University, 8000, Aarhus C, Denmark

    Erik Jeppesen

  5. Limnology Laboratory, Department of Biological Sciences and Centre for Ecosystem Research and Implementation, Middle East Technical University, Ankara, 06800, Turkey

    Erik Jeppesen

  6. Institute of Marine Sciences, Middle East Technical University, Erdemli, Mersin, 33721, Turkey

    Erik Jeppesen

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Gao, J., Hu, S., Yang, C. et al. Shelter availability reduces the effects of the invasive Red Swamp Crayfish (Procambarus clarkii) on eelgrass-dominated clear-water lakes: a mesocosm approach. Hydrobiologia 849, 3597–3606 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-022-04969-8

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