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Trophic structure of apex fish communities in closed versus leaky lakes of arctic Alaska by Stephen L. Klobucar; Phaedra Budy is a Environmental Science article available to read on EtoBox.

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Despite low species diversity and primary production, trophic structure (e.g., top predator species, predator size) is surprisingly variable among Arctic lakes. We investigated trophic structure in lakes of arctic Alaska containing arctic char Salvelinus alpinus using stomach contents and stable isotope ratios in two geographically-close but hydrologically-distinct lake clusters to investigate how these fish may interact and compete for limited food resources. Aside from different lake connectivity patterns ('leaky' versus 'closed'), differing fish communities (up to five versus only two species) between lake clusters allowed us to test trophic hypotheses including: (1) arctic char are more piscivorous, and thereby grow larger and obtain higher trophic positions, in the presence of other fish species; and, (2) between arctic char size classes, resource polymorphism is more prominent, and thereby trophic niches are narrower and overlap less, in the absence of other predators. Regardless of lake cluster, we observed little direct evidence of arctic char consuming other fishes, but char were larger (mean TL = 468 vs 264 mm) and trophic position was higher (mean TP = 4.0 vs 3.8 for lar

Who reads Trophic structure of apex fish communities in closed versus leaky lakes of arctic Alaska?

Author

Stephen L. Klobucar; Phaedra Budy

Publisher

Springer-Verlag; Springer Verlag; Springer Science and Business Media LLC (ISSN 0029-8549)

Published

2020

Language

EN

Field

Environmental Science (Physical Sciences)