Dw. Chess et Ja. Stanford, Experimental effects of temperature and prey assemblage on growth and lipid accumulation by Mysis relicta loven, HYDROBIOL, 412, 1999, pp. 155-164
The opossum shrimp (Mysis relicta) is a holarctic planktivore that undergoe
s diel vertical migration (DVM), ascending at night from deeper water or th
e lake bottom into the upper water column to feed. In deep lakes that therm
ally stratify, M. relicta spends most of the time on or near the lake botto
m in cold water where food resources are low; but, M. relicta migrates dail
y into warmer layers to feed where food resources are more abundant. Hence,
in deep lakes M. relicta traverses steep temperature and prey density grad
ients while migrating through the water column to forage. We conducted a la
boratory growth experiment of factorial design that simulated the range of
temperatures and densities of natural zooplankton forage encountered by M.
relicta during DVM. Somatic growth, measured as change in total length and
lipid-free biomass, was not significantly different among experimental trea
tments. Analysis of variance showed that M. relicta stored energy in the fo
rm of lipid instead of using the energy mainly to drive increased somatic g
rowth, but only at the colder temperatures. Lipid storage was 24% (+/- 4.3
sd) in 4 degrees C-high forage treatment compared to 6% (+/- 1.1) at 14 deg
rees C-high forage treatment. Energy conversion efficiency (ECE) of M. reli
cta was highest (21.3% +/- 5.8) at 4 degrees C and lowest (3.3% +/- 0.9) at
14 degrees C, regardless of prey density. The experiment showed that Mysis
relicta feeds at high food densities where ECE is low, but spends most of
the time in colder water where ECE is high. These results support McLaren's
metabolic efficiency hypothesis, which predicts that feeding in the more p
roductive surface waters and then migrating to colder waters is reproductiv
ely advantageous. Moreover, owing to high metabolic efficiency in the colde
st waters and rapid DVM, M. relicta is able to sequester much of the epilim
netic zooplankton production near or on the lake bottom, thereby forcing th
e lake food web toward a configuration dominated by mysids, benthic or deep
water fishes and small, agile zooplankton.