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Phytoplankton-zooplankton inter-relationships in tropical waters—Grazing and gut pigment dynamics

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Title Phytoplankton-zooplankton inter-relationships in tropical waters—Grazing and gut pigment dynamics
 
Creator Goes, Joaquim I.
Caeiro, Shakuntala
Gomes, Helga do R.
 
Description 116-124
An examinaion of the feeding mechanisms in two taxonomically dissimilar
classes of tropical planktonic herbivores Evadne tergestina (Cladocera)
and Acrocalanus spp. (Copepoda) revealed a distinct rhythmicity of food
intake. Brief bouts of phytoplankton intake were interspersed with breaks
during which grazing activity ceased probably due to the onset of digestive
enzyme activity. Over 90% of the chl a ingested was rapidly degraded
during its passage through the digestive tract of the animals suggesting a high
assimilatory and metabolic capacity within tropical planktonic herbivores as
compared to temperate and polar forms. When subject to prolonged periods of
starvation, both animals exhibited a clear tendency to reingest their own fecal
pellets. In tropical oligotrophic waters where an invariably limiting size of
phytoplankton food stock imposes constraints on zooplankton growth, the ability
of tropical planktonic herbivores to resort to coprophagic feeding assumes
particular importance as existing models make no allowances for reingestion of
fecal pellets when quantifying and computing energy transfer in·the food chain.
 
Date 2014-01-15T08:46:26Z
2014-01-15T08:46:26Z
1999-06
 
Type Article
 
Identifier 0975-1033 (Online); 0379-5136 (Print)
http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/25684
 
Language en_US
 
Rights CC Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India
 
Publisher NISCAIR-CSIR, India
 
Source IJMS Vol.28(2) [June 1999]