Feeding behaviour of the mussel, Mytilus edulis : responses to variations in quantity and organic content of the seston
| Type | Article | ||||||||
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| Date | 1993-11 | ||||||||
| Language | English | ||||||||
| Author(s) | Bayne Bl1, Iglesias Jip2, Hawkins Ajs1, Navarro E2, Heral Maurice3, Deslous Paoli Jean-Marc3 | ||||||||
| Affiliation(s) | 1 : Plymouth Marine Laboratory, The Hoe, Plymouth, PL1 3DH, UK 2 : UNIV BASQUE COUNTRY, DEPT BIOL ANIM & GENET, E-48080 BILBAO, SPAIN. 3 : IFREMER, F-17390 LA TREMBLADE, FRANCE. |
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| Source | Journal Of The Marine Biological Association Of The United Kingdom (0025-3154) (Cambridge Univ Press), 1993-11 , Vol. 73 , N. 4 , P. 813-829 | ||||||||
| WOS© Times Cited | 274 | ||||||||
| Abstract | Mussels were fed four concentrations of seston (between 099 and 103mgtotalseston P), comprising three levels of organic content (719, 636 and 408%), made up from natural silt and two species of cultured phytoplankton. Two of the seston concentrations were below, and two above, the threshold at which pseudofaeces were produced. Measurements of physiological traits (filtration rates, pseudofaeces production, selection efficiency, absorption efficiency, absorption rates and rates of oxygen consumption) were made after 2 days and, for two of the seston concentrations, also after 12 days. When fed at a high concentration of seston of low organic content, the mussels increased their filtration rate, rejected a higher proportion of filtered material as pseudofaeces, and increased the efficiency with which filtered matter of higher organic content was selected for ingestion; this resulted in a constancy of the relationship between ingestion rate and the concentration of particulate organic matter, regardless of differences in seston organic content. Between 2 and 12 d, the mussels increased absorption rates for organics, primarily by increasing absorption efficiency, both for total organics and for the carbohydrate component of the diet. We suggest that these responses to changes in the food environment comprise physiological adjustments which result in higher net rates of absorption than would be predicted from considerations only of the organic/inorganic ratio of the suspended particles and assumptions of a non-compensating feeding behaviour. | ||||||||
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