Trophic relationships in the community of a bivalve mollusk and a boring polychaete |
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| Authors: | A V Silina N V Zhukova |
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| Institution: | (1) Zhirmunskii Institute of Marine Biology, Far East Division, Russian Academy of Sciences, Vladivostok, Russia |
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| Abstract: | The community of the Japanese scallop Mizuhopecten yessoensis with its dominant endobiont polychaete Polydora brevipalpa, which bores into the scallop’s shell, was studied. It was established that the bulk of the scallop’s food ration consists of diatom algae and, to a lesser extent, flagellates and small invertebrates. The polychaete species considered mainly assimilates diatom algae and, to a significant degree, bacteria. Thus, the elements of the community enter competitive food relations. In the process of feeding, the scallop excretes detritus with its pseudofeces and this way increases the concentration of food available for polychaetes. In the course of its motion and filtration, the scallop enhances the water flow around the polychaete, which also favors the feeding of the latter. Meanwhile, negative relations between the degree of the population of the scallop’s shell by polychaetes and the volume of its internal cavity were recognized; this indicates a decrease in the potential for water filtering and, correspondingly, for food procuring by the host mollusk. With the increase in the polychaete-related bioerosion of the shell, the linear sizes and weight parameters of the scallop fall together with the rate of its growth. |
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