Georgia Coastal Ecosystems LTER Data Set Details

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GCE-LTER Data Set Summary

Accession:

INV-GCES-0912

Research Theme:

Aquatic Invertebrate Ecology (Directed Study)

Contributors:

Brian R. Silliman, John Griffin

Title:

Rates of consumption of marsh periwinkles (Littoraria irrorata) by mud crabs (Eurytium limosum and Panopeus obesus) between August and December in a Georgia salt marsh

Abstract:

Predatory mud crabs (Panopeus obesus and Eurytium limosum) are two of the main resident infaunal predators in southeastern US salt marshes.The relative importance of the two species in the trophic control of marsh periwinkles (snails; Littoraria irrorata) is likley to change across seasons. We therefore manipulated the these predator species (Panopeus obesus and Eurytium limosum) in experimental cages in the field (at Dean Creek, Sapelo Island, GA) and assessed monthly predation rates over four months, between 15th August to 15th December. We included 3 treatments, consisting of two treatments containing each species alone, and one containing both species together; all treatments had the same density. Specifically, 1) 4 x Panopeus individuals; 2) 4 x Eurytium individuals; 3) 2 x Panopeus individuals + 2 Eurytium individuals. Only adult crabs (33-40mm carapace diameter) were used. We maintained the treatments over 4 months (15th Aug - 15th Dec 2009), replacing any missing crabs every two weeks and counting the number of snails killed by predators each month.

DOI:

10.6073/pasta/1c7dbb461fd83df7bdd77680696bfa16

Key Words:

Aquatic Invertebrate Monitoring, Eurytium, Littoraria, Panopeus, predation, salt marshes, speciation

LTER Core Area:

Population Studies

Research Themes:

Aquatic Invertebrate Ecology

Study Period:

01-Sep-2009 to 01-Dec-2009

Study Sites:

Sapelo -- Sapelo Island, Sapelo Island, Georgia

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Downloads:

Data Table: INV-GCES-0912 (Main data table for data set INV-GCES-0912, 84 records)

Access: Public (released 15-Dec-2011)

Metadata: Text (ESA FLED), XML (Ecological Metadata Language)

Data Formats: Spreadsheet (CSV) [3.10kb], Text File [2.46kb], MATLAB (GCE Toolbox) [105.27kb], MATLAB (Variables) [74.39kb], Text Report [15.22kb]

Column List:(hide)

Column	Name	Units	Type	Description
1	Plot	none	integer	Unique idetifyer for each experimental plot
2	Treatment	none	string	Crab composition (Panopeus/Eurytium = only specified species; 'combination' = both species)
3	Snails_Consumed	count	integer	Based on middens. Initial density of 300 live Littoraria.
4	Months_Elapsed	nominalMonth	integer	Month after beginning of experiment
5	Sampling_Date	MM/DD/YYYY	string	Actual date on which the plots were sampled

Statistics:

Generate script code to retrieve data tables for analysis in: MATLAB, R, SAS, SPSS

Citation:

Silliman, Brian R. 2009. Rates of consumption of marsh periwinkles (Littoraria irrorata) by mud crabs (Eurytium limosum and Panopeus obesus) between August and December in a Georgia salt marsh. Georgia Coastal Ecosystems LTER Project, University of Georgia, Long Term Ecological Research Network. http://dx.doi.org/10.6073/pasta/1c7dbb461fd83df7bdd77680696bfa16

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