Journal article

Publication year: 2013

Pages: 391-401

Journal: Ecological Modelling

Volume number: 250

ISSN: 0304-3800

DOI Link: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2012.11.001

Publisher: Elsevier

Abstract: 

Movement strategies of small forage fish (<8 cm total length) between
temporary and permanent wetland habitats affect their overall
population growth and biomass concentrations, i.e., availability to
predators. These fish are often the key energy link between primary
producers and top predators, such as wading birds, which require high
concentrations of stranded fish in accessible depths. Expansion and
contraction of seasonal wetlands induce a sequential alternation between
rapid biomass growth and concentration, creating the conditions for
local stranding of small fish as they move in response to varying water
levels. To better understand how landscape topography, hydrology, and
fish behavior interact to create high densities of stranded fish, we
first simulated population dynamics of small fish, within a dynamic food
web, with different traits for movement strategy and growth rate,
across an artificial, spatially explicit, heterogeneous, two-dimensional
marsh slough landscape, using hydrologic variability as the driver for
movement. Model output showed that fish with the highest tendency to
invade newly flooded marsh areas built up the largest populations over
long time periods with stable hydrologic patterns. A higher probability
to become stranded had negative effects on long-term population size,
and offset the contribution of that species to stranded biomass. The
model was next applied to the topography of a 10 km × 10 km area of
Everglades landscape. The details of the topography were highly
important in channeling fish movements and creating spatiotemporal
patterns of fish movement and stranding. This output provides data that
can be compared in the future with observed locations of fish biomass
concentrations, or such surrogates as phosphorus ‘hotspots’ in the
marsh.

Harvard Citation style: Yurek, S., DeAngelis, D., Trexler, J., Jopp, F. and Donalson, D. (2013) Simulating mechanisms for dispersal, production and stranding of small forage fish in temporary wetland habitats, Ecological Modelling, 250, pp. 391-401. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2012.11.001

APA Citation style: Yurek, S., DeAngelis, D., Trexler, J., Jopp, F., & Donalson, D. (2013). Simulating mechanisms for dispersal, production and stranding of small forage fish in temporary wetland habitats. Ecological Modelling. 250, 391-401. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2012.11.001