Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-18T08:58:55.541Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

What do barnacle larvae feed on? Implications in biofouling ecology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 December 2009

Chetan A. Gaonkar  and
Arga Chandrashekar Anil
Chetan A. Gaonkar
Affiliation:
National Institute of Oceanography (Council of Scientific and Industrial Research), Dona-Paula, Goa 403 004, India
Arga Chandrashekar Anil*
Affiliation:
National Institute of Oceanography (Council of Scientific and Industrial Research), Dona-Paula, Goa 403 004, India
*
Correspondence should be addressed to: A.C. Anil, National Institute of Oceanography, Dona Paula, Goa- 403 004, India email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Barnacles are one of the dominant macrofouling organisms found in the intertidal region throughout the world. Among the different species of barnacles Balanus amphitrite (=Amphibalanus amphitrite) is a favoured candidate organism used in experimental studies. Larval development in this barnacle includes planktotrophic naupliar stages followed by pre-settling cyprid instar. Studies have shown that availability of food during naupliar development is of critical importance to successful metamorphosis of the cypris larva. Traditionally barnacle larvae are raised in the laboratory providing mono-algal cultures of diatoms as food organisms. Such a luxury is not a reality in the wild. Observations to quantify the food available for the nauplii deliberated by monitoring the faecal pellets egested by freshly captured larvae from a tropical estuarine environment (Dona Paula bay, Goa, west coast of India) influenced by monsoon and characteristic temporal variations in the phytoplankton abundance and diversity indicated that the percentage of defaecating larvae (an indicator of food consumed) was comparatively higher during the pre-monsoon season. Generally this season is characterized by lower chlorophyll-a concentration. However, the average number of faecal pellets defaecated by a larva remained constant irrespective of the season. Earlier work in the study area depicts temporal changes in phytoplankton community structure; diatoms dominate during the post-monsoon season whereas dinoflagellates dominate during the pre-monsoon season. These observations indicate a possible shift in the food available for the larvae. As the faecal pellets did not always have remnants of diatom frustules, it is possible to say that the larvae survived on food material other than diatoms. Settlement of barnacles on panels of aluminium in the vicinity was monitored throughout the year and peaked during the pre-monsoon season. It is thus possible to infer successful larval development and metamorphosis in this barnacle species on varying forms of food.

Keywords

barnacle larvaeBalanus amphitrite (=Amphibalanus amphitrite)faecal pelletsphytoplanktondiatomsdispersionsettlement and recruitment
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom , Volume 90 , Special Issue 6: In Honour of Sir Frederick Stratten Russell, FRS , September 2010 , pp. 1241 - 1247
Copyright
Copyright © Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Anil, A.C., Chiba, K., Okamoto, K. and Kurokura, H. (1995) Influence of temperature and salinity on the larval development of Balanus amphitrite: implications in the fouling ecology. Marine Ecology Progress Series 118, 159–166.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anil, A.C. and Kurian, J. (1996) Influence of food concentration, temperature and salinity on the larval development of Balanus amphitrite. Marine Biology 127, 115–124.Google Scholar
Anil, A.C., Desai, D. and Khandeparker, L. (2001) Larval development and metamorphosis in Balanus amphitrite Darwin (Cirripedia: Thoracica): significance of food concentration, temperature and nucleic acids. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 263, 125–141.Google Scholar
Bathmann, U. and Liebezeit, G. (2008) Chlorophyll in copepod fecal pellets: changes in pellet numbers and pigment content during a declining Baltic spring bloom. Marine Ecology 7, 59–73.Google Scholar
Desai, D.V. and Anil, A.C. (2000) Influence of temperature on the starvation threshold of nauplii of the barnacle Balanus amphitrite (Cirripedia: Thoracica). Indian Journal of Marine Science 29, 69–72.Google Scholar
Desai, D.V. and Anil, A.C. (2002) Comparison of nutritional status of field and laboratory reared Balanus amphitrite Darwin (Cirripedia: Thoracica) larvae and implication of starvation. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 280, 117–134.Google Scholar
Desai, D.V. and Anil, A.C. (2004) The impact of food type, temperature and starvation on larval development of Balanus amphitrite Darwin (Cirripedia: Thoracica). Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 306, 113–137.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Desai, D.V., Khandeparker, L. and Shirayama, Y. (2006) Larval development and metamorphosis of Balanus albicostatus (Cirripedia: Thoracica): implications of temperature, food concentration and energetics. Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 86, 335–343.Google Scholar
Fleddum, A., Kaartvedt, S. and Ellertsen, B. (2001) Distribution and feeding of the carnivorous copepod Paraeuchaeta norvegica in habitats of shallow prey assemblages and midnight sun. Marine Biology 139, 719–726.Google Scholar
Frangoulis, C., Belkhiria, S., Goffart, A. and Hecq, J.H. (2001) Dynamics of copepod fecal pellets in relation to a Phaeocystis dominated phytoplankton bloom: characteristics, production and flux. Journal of Plankton Research 23, 75–88.Google Scholar
Honjo, S. and Roman, M.R. (1978) Marine copepod fecal pellets: production, preservation and sedimentation. Journal of Marine Research 36, 45–56.Google Scholar
Isomura, N. and Nishihira, M. (2001) Size variation of planulae and its effect on the lifetime of planulae in three pocilloporid corals. Coral Reefs 20, 309–315.Google Scholar
Jarrett, J.N. (1997) Temporal variation in substrate specificity of Semibalanus balanoides (Linnaeus) cyprids. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 211, 103–114.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Knight-Jones, E.W. (1953) Laboratory experiments on gregariousness during settling in Balanus balanoides and other barnacles. Journal of Experimental Biology 30, 584–599.Google Scholar
Lucas, M.I., Walker, G., Holland, D.L. and Crisp, D.J. (1979) An energy-budget for the free-swimming and metamorphosing larvae of Balanus balanoides (Crustacea: Cirrepedia). Marine Biology 55, 221–229.Google Scholar
Marshall, D.J. and Keough, M.J. (2003) Variation in the dispersal potential of non-feeding invertebrate larvae: the desperate larva hypothesis and larval size. Marine Ecology Progress Series 255, 145–153.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marshall, D.J., Pechenik, J.A. and Keough, M.J. (2003) Larval activity levels and delayed metamorphosis affect post-larval performance in the colonial ascidian Diplosoma listerianum. Marine Ecology Progress Series 246, 153–162.Google Scholar
Miron, G., Walters, L.J., Tremblay, R. and Bourget, E. (2000) Physiological condition and barnacle larval behavior: a preliminary look at the relationship between TAG/DNA ratio and larval substratum exploration in Balanus amphitrite. Marine Ecology Progress Series 198, 303–310.Google Scholar
Morales, C.E. (1987) Carbon and nitrogen content of copepod fecal pellets: effect of food concentration and feeding behaviour. Marine Ecology Progress Series 36, 107–114.Google Scholar
Nasrolahi, A., Sari, A., Saifabadi, S. and Malek, M. (2007) Effects of algal diet on larval survival and growth of the barnacle Amphibalanus (=Balanus) improvisus. Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 87, 1227–1233.Google Scholar
Nejstgaard, J.C., Tang, K.W., Steinke, M., Dutz, J., Koski, M., Antajan, E. and Long, J.D. (2007) Zooplankton grazing on Phaeocystis: a quantitative review and future challenges. Biochemistry 83, 147–172.Google Scholar
Patil, J.S. and Anil, A.C. (2008) Temporal variation of diatom benthic propagules in a monsoon-influenced tropical estuary. Continental Shelf Research 28, 2404–2416.Google Scholar
Pechenik, J.A., Wendt, D.E. and Jarrett, J.N. (1998) Metamorphosis is not a new beginning. Bioscience 48, 901–910.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ploug, H., Iversen, M.H., Koski, M. and Buitenhuis, E.T. (2008) Production, oxygen respiration rates and sinking velocity of copepod fecal pellets: direct measurements of ballasting by opal and calcite. Limnology and Oceanography 53, 469–476.Google Scholar
Qiu, J.W. and Qian, P.Y. (1997) Effects of food availability, larval source and culture method on larval development of Balanus amphitrite amphitrite Darwin: implications for experimental design. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology 217, 47–61.Google Scholar
Schnetzer, A. and Steinberg, D.K. (2002) Active transport of particulate organic carbon and nitrogen by vertically migrating zooplankton in the Sargasso Sea. Marine Ecology Progress Series 234, 71–84.Google Scholar
Sokal, R.R. and Rohlf, F.J. (1981) Biometry. 2nd edition. San Francisco: W.H. Freeman and Company.Google Scholar
Thiyagarajan, V., Nair, K.V.K., Subramoniam, T. and Venugopalan, V.P. (2002) Larval settlement behaviour of the barnacle Balanus reticulatus in the laboratory. Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 82, 579–582.Google Scholar
Toonen, R.J. and Pawlik, J.R. (2001) Settlement of the gregarious tube worm Hydroides dianthus (Polychaeta: Serpulidae) II: testing the desperate larvae hypothesis. Marine Ecology Progress Series 224, 115–131.Google Scholar
Turner, J.T., Levinsen, H., Nielsen, T.G. and Hansen, B.W. (2001) Zooplankton feeding ecology: grazing on phytoplankton and predation on protozoans by copepod and barnacle nauplii in Disko Bay, West Greenland. Marine Ecology Progress Series 221, 209–219.Google Scholar
Urban-Rich, J., Hansell, D.A. and Roman, M.R. (1998) Analysis of copepod fecal carbon using a high temperature combustion method. Marine Ecology Progress Series 171, 199–208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vargas, C.A., Manriquez, P.H. and Navarrete, S.A. (2006) Feeding larvae of intertidal invertebrates: assessing their position in pelagic food webs. Ecology 87, 444–457.Google Scholar