Zooplankton food webs of Lake Okeechobee, Florida, were analyzed in or
der to examine spatiotemporal variability and test for scale dependenc
e of major food web properties. 46 webs were constructed from data col
lected during several years (1988-92) at six locations. For all these
webs, the following food web properties were calculated: number of spe
cies, total links, links per species, connectance, percentage of top a
nd intermediate species, and food chain length. We did not find any st
atistically significant spatiotemporal variation in these properties.
Still, there were consistent differences seasonally (summer vs winter)
and spatially (littoral vs pelagic habitats). There was also a very c
lear nonlinear scale dependence in most food web properties: links per
species, food chain length, and proportions of top and intermediate s
pecies vs number of species. The scale dependence was strong for small
webs, but became weaker for larger webs. The relatively simple food w
ebs and consistently collected data used in our study provide some of
the dearest and most statistically significant results to date. They h
elp reconcile the debate about scale invariance vs dependence in major
food web properties.