Comparisons between the influences of habitat, body size and season on the dietary composition of the sparid Acanthopagrus latus in a large marine embayment

Seasonal samples from Shark Bay on the west coast of Australia were used to determine (1) the habitats occupied by the juveniles and adults of Acanthopagrus latus in this large subtropical marine embayment and (2) the extent to which the dietary composition of this sparid is influenced by habitat type, body length and season. Sampling was undertaken in two habitat types in which A. latus was known to be abundant, namely mangrove (Avicennia marina) creeks and nearby rocky areas, the latter comprising sandstone boulders and/or limestone reefs. The mean total length ±95% CLs of A. latus was far lower in mangrove creeks, 126 ± 6.1 mm, than in rocky areas, 313 ± 4.7 mm. As A. latus attains maturity at ca. 245 mm, the juveniles of this species typically occupy mangrove areas and then, with increasing body size, move to nearshore rocky areas, where they become adults. The species composition of the food ingested by juvenile A. latus in mangrove creeks differed markedly from that of large juveniles and adults in rocky areas. Based on analyses of data for both habitat types combined, this difference was far greater than that between size classes and season, which was negligible. There were indications, however, that, overall within each habitat, the dietary composition did change seasonally, although not with body size. Acanthopagrus latus fed predominantly on mangrove material, sesarmid crabs and small gastropods in mangrove habitats, and mainly on Brachidontes ustulatus in rocky areas, where this mytilid bivalve is very abundant. The mangrove material, which contributed nearly 40% of its overall dietary volume in mangrove creeks, consisted mainly of lateral root primordia. This apparently unique food source for a teleost is presumably ingested through subsurface nipping, which would be facilitated by the mouth and dentitional characteristics of sparids. The almost total lack of correspondence in the dietary compositions of fish in the length class that was well represented in both mangrove and rocky areas illustrates the extent to which this sparid is capable of opportunistic feeding behaviour.     

Subsurface Water Masses in the Central North Pacific Transition Region: The Repeat Section along the 18° Meridian

A repeat hydrographic section has been maintained over two decades along the 180° meridian across the subarctic-subtropical transition region. The section is naturally divided into at least three distinct zones. In the Subarctic Zone north of 46°N, the permanent halocline dominates the density stratification, supporting a subsurface temperature minimum (STM). The Subarctic Frontal Zone (SFZ) between 42°–46°N is the region where the subarctic halocline outcrops. To the south is the Subtropical Zone, where the permanent thermocline dominates the density stratification, containing a pycnostad of North Pacific Central Mode Water (CMW). The STM water colder than 4°C in the Subarctic Zone is originated in the winter mixed layer of the Bering Sea. The temporal variation of its core temperature lags 12–16 months behind the variations of both the winter sea surface temperature (SST) and the summer STM temperature in the Bering Sea, suggesting that the thermal anomalies imposed on the STM water by wintertime air-sea interaction in the Bering Sea spread over the western subarctic gyre, reaching the 180° meridian within a year or so. The CMW in this section originates in the winter mixed layer near the northern edge of the Subtropical Zone between 160°E and 180°. The CMW properties changed abruptly from 1988 to 1989; its temperature and salinity increased and its potential density decreased. It is argued that these changes were caused by the climate regime shift in 1988/1989 characterized by weakening of the Aleutian Low and the westerlies and increase in the SST in the subarctic-subtropical transition region. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

中太平洋海山群漂移史及其来源

中太平洋海山群的海山呈簇状排列且近EW向展布于太平洋海山密集区，其四周分布着一系列NW走向的线性列岛及规模巨大的水下海山链。它位于明显属于海山链构造的夏威夷群岛和马绍尔群岛之间，处于莱恩群岛的北西向延伸方向上，与热点作用的板内火山作用关系密切。结合前人对中太平洋海山群形成和漂移的认识，从板块运动和几何学角度出发，采用Backtracking和Hot-spotting海山追踪方法对该区海山进行了追踪，发现该区海山的热点源主要位于现今法属玻利尼西亚群岛区（法属玻利尼西亚热点群），这与前人从古地磁和钻探资料出发得到的结果相接近。研究表明，中太平洋海山群是多热点成因的板内火山作用和板块构造运动的共同产物，它在130～90Ma期间起源于法属玻利尼西亚热点群，曾随着太平洋板块发生过向南和向北的运动，既有水平方向的漂移又有垂直方向上的升降，在漂移和升降过程中还受到了当时大规模多期的热点活动和断裂活动的改造作用，经过一个漫长的过程后才到达今天的位置，最后形成了现今呈簇状分布的海山群。     

Processes Causing the Temporal Changes in Si/N Ratios of Nutrient Consumptions and Export Flux during the Spring Diatom Bloom

Two processes are generally explained as causes of temporal changes in the stoichiometric silicon/nitrogen (Si/N) ratios of sinking particles and of nutrient consumption in the surface water during the spring diatom bloom: (1) physiological changes of diatom under the stress of photosynthesis of diatom and (2) differences of regeneration between silicon and nitrogen. We investigated which process plays an important role in these changes using a one-dimensional ecosystem model that explicitly represents diatom and the other non-silicious phytoplankton. The model was applied to station A7 (41°30′ N, 145°30′ E) in the western North Pacific, where diatom regularly blooms in spring. Model simulations show that the Si/N ratios of the flux exported by the sinking particles at 100 m depth and of nutrient consumptions in the upper 100 m surface water have their maxima at the end of the spring diatom bloom, the values and timings of which are significantly different from each other. Analyses of the model results show that the differences of regeneration between silicon and nitrogen mainly cause the temporal changes of the Si/N ratios. On the other hand, the physiological changes of diatoms under stress can hardly cause these temporal changes, because the effect of the change in the diatom's uptake ratio of silicon to nitrogen is cancelled by that in its sinking rate.     

In Situ Measurement of Pinna nobilis Shells for Age and Growth Studies: A New Device

Abstract. Pinna nobilis Linnaeus 1758 is an endemic bivalve mollusc in the Mediterranean Sea, where it inhabits seagrass meadows, especially Posidonia oceanica (L.) Delile. It is the largest bivalve in the Mediterranean, reaching lengths up to 120 cm. In its natural habitat, P. nobilis lives with the anterior part of the valve buried in the seabed, attached to Posidonia rhizomes by byssus threads.
This habit makes it impossible to measure its total length directly in situ. As the only way to determine the individual age is the relationship between age and total length, several equations have been proposed to estimate total length by relating it to the unburied parts of the shell. Such measurements are essential to ecological studies that consider age, growth, and population dynamics, and that evaluate the environmental factors that affect this species.
Accurately estimating total length depends on the accuracy and precision of the method employed to measure the unburied shell parts. In this paper, we point out the lack of precision of the instruments and methods used until now; we also demonstrate the reason for this imprecision. A new device to measure unburied parts of Pinna nobilis with a precision comparable to that obtained when measuring extracted valves is described. This device is unaffected by substratum type and reduces measurement time. The latter is a very important feature, because these procedures are usually performed whilst SCUBA diving. Finally, a growth equation has been fitted to the measurements obtained with the new device from a population located in Moraira (Alicante, western Mediterranean).     

Air-Sea Gas Transfer Velocity in Stormy Winter Estimated from Radon Deficiency

Thirteen vertical profiles of ²²⁶Ra and ²²²Rn in the near-surface water were obtained in the western North Pacific in winter, and the gas transfer velocities across the air-sea interface were estimated. The transfer velocities found by applying a steady state model varied widely from 2.1 to 30.2 m day⁻¹ with a mean of 9.4 m day⁻¹. The mean value is almost 5 times higher than that in summer in other oceans, and the maximum value is a record high for world oceans. This is partly due to the inadequacy of the steady state model, which overestimates when stronger winds blow in more recent days than the ²²²Rn half-life of about 4 days. In fact, a strong low pressure zone passed through the station about 2 days earlier, which was one of the low pressure zones that with a period of develop once a week or so in the northwestern North Pacific in winter. Instead of steady-state removal, if half of the radon removal occurred sporadically every 7 days, and the last removal took place two days before the observation, the transfer velocity would be 26 m day⁻¹. Our mean transfer velocity, which is less than 20% different from the steady state value including both overestimated and underestimated values, 9.4 ± 4.8 m day⁻¹, seems to represent the mean state of this region in winter. This suggests that the gas exchange fluxes under extremely rough conditions in the open ocean are larger than those estimated by using a transfer velocity equation with a linear or quadratic relationship with wind speed. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Evidence for the grazing hypothesis: Grazing reduces phytoplankton responses of the HNLC ecosystem to iron enrichment in the western subarctic pacific (SEEDS II)

A mesoscale iron-enrichment study (SEEDS II) was carried out in the western subarctic Pacific in the summer of 2004. The iron patch was traced for 26 days, which included observations of the development and the decline of the bloom by mapping with sulfur hexafluoride. The experiment was conducted at almost the same location and the same season as SEEDS (previous iron-enrichment experiment). However, the results were very different between SEEDS and SEEDS II. A high accumulation of phytoplankton biomass (∼18 mg chl m⁻³) was characteristic of SEEDS. In contrast, in SEEDS II, the surface chlorophyll-a accumulation was lower, 0.8 to 2.48 mg m⁻³, with no prominent diatom bloom. Photosynthetic competence in terms of F _v/F _m for the total phytoplankton community in the surface waters increased after the iron enrichments and returned to the ambient level by day 20. These results suggest that the photosynthetic physiology of the phytoplankton assemblage was improved by the iron enrichments and returned to an iron-stressed condition during the declining phase of the bloom. Pico-phytoplankton (<2 μm) became dominant in the chlorophyll-a size distribution after the bloom. We observed a nitrate drawdown of 3.8 μM in the patch (day 21), but there was no difference in silicic acid concentration between inside and outside the patch. Mesozooplankton (copepod) biomass was three to five times higher during the bloom-development phase in SEEDS II than in SEEDS. The copepod biomass increased exponentially. The grazing rate estimation indicates that the copepod grazing prevented the formation of an extensive diatom bloom, which was observed in SEEDS, and led to the change to a pico-phytoplankton dominated community towards the end of the experiment.     

中国多金属结核开辟区东、西两小区小型底栖动物的空间分布

利用 1 998年“大洋一号”调查船 DY95 - 8航次在中国多金属结核开辟区东、西两小区用多管取样器采集的沉积物样品 ,对小型底栖动物的组成、分布及其与环境因子的关系进行了研究。结果表明 :(1 )东、西两小区共有 1 6个类群的小型底栖动物 ,其中线虫类占居显著优势 ,在东、西两小区各占总栖息密度的 71 %和 6 4 %,其次为猛水蚤类和蜱螨类。 (2 )东、西两小区小型底栖动物类群平均栖息密度分别为 3 2 .47ind/1 0 cm2 和 1 8.0 5 ind/1 0 cm2 ,东小区高于西小区。小区各站位间的栖息密度平面分布差异显著。 (3 )东、西两小区小型底栖动物类群栖息密度的垂直分布趋势明显 ,由表层向底层 ,栖息密度逐渐降低。 (4)东、西两小区小型底栖动物空间分布与底质沉积物、结核覆盖率和底层流等环境因子密切相关 ,底质较硬、结核覆盖率较高以及底层流较强都不利于小型底栖动物的栖息。