Copepod community growth rates in relation to body size, temperature, and food availability in the East China Sea: a test of metabolic theory of ecology

[摘要] Zooplanktonplay an essential role in marine food webs, and understanding howcommunity-level growth rates of zooplankton vary in the field is critical forpredicting how marine ecosystem function may vary in the face ofenvironmental changes. Here, we used the artificial cohort method to examinethe effects of temperature, body size, and chlorophyll concentration (a proxyfor food) on weight-specific growth rates for copepod communities in the EastChina Sea. Specifically, we tested the hypothesis that copepod communitygrowth rates can be described by the metabolic theory of ecology (MTE),linking spatio-temporal variation of copepod growth rate with temperature andtheir body size. Our results generally agree with predictions made by the MTEand demonstrate that weight-specific growth rates of copepod communities inour study area are positively related with temperature and negatively relatedto body size. However, the regression coefficients of body size do notapproach the theoretical predictions. Furthermore, we find that the deviationfrom the MTE predictions may be partly attributed to the effect of foodavailability (which is not explicitly accounted for by the MTE). In addition,significant difference in the coefficients of temperature and body sizeexists among taxonomic groups. Our results suggest that considering theeffects of food limitation and taxonomy is necessary to better understandcopepod growth rates under in situ conditions, and such effects on theMTE-based predictions need further investigation.

[学科分类] 地球化学与岩石