The trophic structure and predation impact of a low latitude midwater fish assemblage

doi:10.1016/S0079-6611(97)00003-7

Progress in Oceanography

Volume 38, Issue 3, 1996, Pages 205-239

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0079-6611(97)00003-7 Get rights and content

Abstract

The trophic ecology of a midwater fish assemblage was investigated in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, a regime exhibiting the principal physical-biological characteristics of oligotrophic low latitude ecosystems. In all, the diets of 164 species of midwater fishes were examined, with data for 121 being sufficient for analytical comparisons. Cluster analysis grouped the assemblage into 15 feeding guilds, with these falling into two major groups, those including zooplanktivores with largely crustacean diets, and those including predators on large prey, most of which were piscivores. Among the zooplanktivores, the principal predators were the Myctophidae, Sternoptychidae and Gonostomatidae which, respectively, consumed 31%, 27% and 14% of the food biomass eaten daily by the midwater fish assemblage. The myctophids alone accounted for 53% of the copepod and 40% of the euphausiid biomass ingested. The copepod genus Pleuromamma was especially important forage, constituting 40% of the copepod biomass consumed by the midwater fish assemblage. The Stomiidae were the dominant piscivores and accounted for 20% of the total food ingested daily and 61% of the fish eaten, with the majority of their prey being myctophids. Literature comparisons reveal that diet patterns for the eastern Gulf midwater assemblage closely resemble those for mid- to- low latitude oligotrophic regimes in general.

Daily consumption of the entire assemblage is estimated at 2.5–4.3 kg C km⁻² in the upper 1000 m. Four fifths of this is zooplankton while the balance is large prey, mostly fishes. The ingestion rate accounts for only 5–10% of the daily production of zooplankton, but 95% of fish daily production. While the latter is obviously an overestimate it does suggest a tighter nutritional coupling of the midwater fish assemblage with the upper trophic levels of the ecosystem than with zooplankton. Midwater fishes and shrimps, the two dominant groups of micronekton, together account for only 25% of zooplankton daily production consumed in the eastern Gulf and it remains unresolved as to which midwater ecosystem components are responsible for most of the utilization of zooplankton food resources.

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The trophic structure and predation impact of a low latitude midwater fish assemblage

Abstract

Deep-Sea Research

Progress in Oceanography

Deep-Sea Research

Deep-Sea Research

Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology

Progress in Oceanography

Ecological studies of micronektonic shrimps (Crustacea, Decapoda) in the Western North Pacific

Bulletin of the Ocean Research Institute, University of Tokyo

Studies on food organisms of pelagic fishes as revealed by the 1979 North Atlantic Eel Expedition

Helgoländer Meeresuntersuchengen

Trophodynamics of the fish Valenciennellus tripunctulatus. II. Selectivity, grazing rates and resource utilization

Marine Ecology - Progress Series

Trophodynamics of the fish Valenciennellus tripunctulatus. III. Energetics, resources and feeding strategy

Marine Ecology - Progress Series

Diet and feeding chronology of Diaphus taaningi (Myctophidae) in the Cariaco Trench

Copeia

Eastern Pacific expeditions of the New York Zoological Society, XXXIII. Pacific Myctophidae (fishes)

Zoologica (New York)

Aspects of the ecology of the calanoid copepod genus Pleuromamma in the eastern Gulf of Mexico

Contributions in Marine Science

Ecology of euphausiids in the Gulf of St. Lawrence

Journal of the Fisheries Research Board of Canada

The ceratioid fishes

Ontogeny, taxonomy, distribution, and biology

Dana Report

Le copépod planctonique Calanoides carinatus

Répartition et cycle biologique au large de la côte d'Ivoire

Cahiers O.R.S.T.O.M. Serie Oceanographic

The feeding of mesopelagic predatory fish in the open ocean

Journal of Ichthyology

Studies on the fauna associated with the deep scattering layers in the equatorial Indian Ocean, conducted on R/V Te Vega during October and November 1964

An ordination of the upland forest communities of southern Wisconsin

Ecological Monographs

Physiological energetics

The study of feeding habits of two marine fishes in relation to plankton ecology

Transactions of the American Microscopical Society

The vertical distribution and feeding habits of two common midwater fishes (Leuroglossus stilbius and Stenobrachius leucopsarus) off Santa Barbara

California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigation Report

Diel feeding patterns of 16 species of mesopelagic fishes from Hawaiian waters

Fishery Bulletin, United States

Diets of fourteen species of vertically migrating mesopelagic fishes in Hawaiian waters

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Feeding habits of stomiatoid fishes from Hawaiian waters

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