Search

Artificial structures in coastal areas provide substrates which facilitate the spread of non-native species. Published records of introduced benthic species in the coastal waters of Angola are scar...

The current work aims to present systematic information about encrusting fouling bryozoan fauna collected from Hurghada, Egyptian Red Sea. During September 2015, scraped fouling samples were collected from beneath the jetty of the National Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries, Red Sea branch, Egypt. Five species of encrusting bryozoan are recorded in the present study. These are Celleporaria aperta , Parasmittina egyptiaca , Watersipora subtorquata , Hippopodina feegeensis and Scorpiodinipora costulata , affiliating to 5 families, which belong to the suborder Neocheilostomina. Parasmittina egyptiaca , Hippopodina feegeensis and Scorpiodinipora costulata are new records from Hurghada, Red Sea waters. Descriptions of the recorded species are given with illustrative photos as well as their geographical distribution and habitats.

Offspring size varies at all levels of organisation, among species, mothers and clutches. This variation is thought to be the result of a tradeoff between offspring quality and quantity, where larger offspring perform better but are more costly to produce. Local environmental conditions alter the benefits of increased offspring size and thereby mediate selection on this trait. For sessile organisms, dispersal is a crucial part of the offspring phase, and in animals, bigger offspring tend to better endure longer dispersal distances than smaller offspring because they have more energy. Theory predicts that increasing distances between suitable habitats strengthens selection for larger offspring. We manipulated the dispersal duration of offspring of different sizes in the bryozoan Watersipora subtorquata and then examined the relationship between offspring size and post-metamorphic performance in the field. We found that selection on offspring size is altered by larval experience. Larger offspring had higher post-settlement performance if the larval period was short but, contrary to current theory, performed worse when the larval period was extended. The reversal of the relationship between offspring size and performance by extending the larval phase in Watersipora may be due to the way in which offspring size affects growth in this species. Regardless of the mechanism, it appears that experiences in one life-history stage alter selection on offspring size in another stage, even when they occupy identical habitats as adults. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Leisure-craft mooring lines were surveyed in six berthing areas along the Croatian coast during June 2014. The aim of this study was to investigate the presence of non-indigenous species (NIS) on mooring lines known as ‘lazy’ lines. Four NIS were observed during the survey: the tunicate Styela plicata, the serpulid Hydroides elegans and two bryozoans, Celleporaria brunnea, and Amathia verticillata. Three cryptogenic species were also found during the survey: the amphipod Elasmopus rapax, the barnacle Amphibalanus amphitrite, and the bryozoan Watersipora subtorquata. Styela plicata, C. brunnea, and W. subtorquata represent the first records for Croatia. Furthermore, C. brunnea and W. subtorquata are new to the whole Adriatic Sea. All NIS and cryptogenic species were recorded in Biograd na Moru. In addition, S. plicata was also recorded in Zadar. The use of ‘lazy’ lines proved to be a rapid and effective method for recording sessile species and monitoring NIS presence. This method could be undertaken for regular NIS surveys of leisure-craft berthing areas.

Both foundation species and introduced species have exceptional influence on community diversity and structure, though they have historically been thought to have opposite effects. However, when introduced species can provide novel habitat within a community, their benefit to the community as a foundation species may outweigh their cost as an invader. The magnitude or direction of species interactions can depend on the environment, thus the net effect of introduced foundation species can vary across different environmental factors. A settlement tile experiment was conducted on the fouling communities of California harbors to determine whether the effects of a widespread invasive bryozoan, Watersipora subtorquata, vary between two locations in its California range, Alamitos Bay and Bodega Harbor. Treatments with live and dead colonies and two sizes of blank tiles were used to evaluate the effects of colony structure and available bare substrate on both mobile and sessile species in the community. Though mobile invertebrate communities in each location across treatments were not significantly dissimilar to each other, communities on large tiles were significantly dissimilar to other communities in each location. Mobile species richness was greatest on live colony and small tiles in Bodega, but greatest on dead colony and large tiles in Alamitos. Both the diversity and community structure of sessile invertebrates across treatments differed significantly between regions. Diversity was greatest on dead colony tiles in Alamitos, where communities were more dissimilar across treatments, but was greatest on live W. subtorquata tiles in Bodega where communities were less dissimilar across treatments. These results highlight the potential for W. subtorquata to have location-dependent net effects on the community throughout its invasive range as a foundation species.

For organisms with complex life cycles, longer time spent in the plankton by dispersing propagules can cause reduced survival, growth and fecundity, which could alter interactions between neighbours in the post-dispersal environment. We compared post-settlement performance of bryozoan Watersipora subtorquata colonies that developed from larvae of different natural and experimental planktonic durations over ca. 15 wk of colony growth. Settlers were situated either near established adults of the ascidian Botrylloides leachii or without competition. In creased larval planktonic durations reduced colony growth in the absence of competition; colonies that developed from longer or delayed larval durations were 2 to 3 times smaller than those that developed from shorter durations. Colonies that developed from longer larval periods (natural or experimental) also experienced higher mortality (75 to 100%) than those that settled quickly (20 to 42%), but these effects varied between experiments and seasons. In winter, W. subtorquata colonies of longer larval planktonic durations experienced greater mortality when adjacent to established B. leachii, whereas differences in colony growth due to planktonic duration were reduced by adjacent B. leachii. The influence of B. leachii varied between experiments in different seasons, however, and did not alter colony performance in summer. Our findings demonstrate that while increased larval planktonic duration can be costly for post-dispersal growth and survival, some differences can be mediated by species inter-actions and environmental variability. This suggests that while connectivity among populations that take longer to disperse may be limited, it may also be influenced in complex ways by the post-recruitment environment and not simply dispersal duration.

Determinants of adult performance, such as growth and survival, are influenced by extrinsic, environmental and intrinsic, phenotypic factors. The relative importance of extrinsic and intrinsic factors, while ecologically relevant, is rarely estimated simultaneously. We estimate the relative contributions of offspring size (intrinsic) and various environmental factors (extrinsic) on adult performance in the marine colonial bryozoan Watersipora subtorquata. We used a variance partitioning approach for both new and previously published data, enabling us to examine the performance of over 1000 individuals in the field. We found offspring size to explain relatively little variation in adult performance. Of the environmental factors taken to account, temporal variation and an environmental gradient had the strongest influences.

Determining how various factors contribute to the invasibility of systems is essential for both understanding community formation and informing management of natural areas. Research demonstrating that predators can provide biotic resistance to invasions by consuming invasive species has led to the presence of healthy predator populations being associated with reduced invasion potential of ecosystems. However, predators structure communities in many ways and their presence could also potentially facilitate invasions if they decrease populations of native species that compete with or consume an invader. We considered these two impacts of predators on invasion by analyzing the effects of two keystone predators (Pisaster spp. and Enhydra lutris nereis) on two foundation species (a native mussel Mytilus californianus and the invasive exotic bryozoan Watersipora subtorquata, a putative competitor for space with Mytilus californianus). Both native predators were found to facilitate the invasion of the exotic bryozoan, and the rate of invasion was highest when both predators were present. Facilitation of W. subtorquata occurred via indirect mechanisms that partly involved the removal of a competitor (mussels) via predation. These results illustrate that although predators can provide biotic resistance to invasion, healthy predator populations do not always confer this advantage and in fact may facilitate invasions. Therefore, implementation of management actions to enhance populations of top predators could also potentially increase the invasibility of some ecosystems.

1.Population density affects individual performance, though its effects are often mixed. For sessile species, increases in population density typically reduce performance. Still, cases of positive density dependence do occur in sessile systems and demand explanation. The stress gradient hypothesis (SGH) predicts that under stressful conditions, positive effects of facilitation may outweigh the negative effects of competition. 2.While some elements of the SGH are well studied, its potential to explain intraspecific facilitation has received little attention. Further, there have been questions regarding whether the SGH holds if the stressor is a resource. Most studies of interactions between the environment and intraspecific facilitation have relied on natural environmental gradients; manipulative studies are much rarer. 3.To test the effects of intraspecific density and resources, we manipulated resource availability over natural population densities for the marine bryozoan Watersipora subtorquata. 4.We found negative effects of density on colony performance in low resource environments, but mainly positive density-dependence in high resource environments. By adding resources, competition effects were reduced and the positive effects of facilitation were revealed. 5.Our results suggest that resource availability mediates the relative strength of competition and facilitation in our system. We also suggest that intraspecific facilitation is more common than may be appreciated and that environmental variation may mediate the balance between negative and positive density-dependence. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

Epibenthic fouling communities are dominated by invasive species that are globally distributed and can have substantial ecological and economic impacts in coastal habitats. Little is known about inter-specific differences in life history strategies that cosmopolitan invasive species employ to acquire space and succeed in invaded habitats. The goal of this study was to examine the impact of seawater temperature on recruitment and growth of several cosmopolitan fouling species including the tunicates Botrylloides violaceus, Botryllus schlosseri and Diplosoma listerianum, as well as the bryozoans Bugula neritina and Watersipora subtorquata. To do this, the iBARGE (Invasive Bryozoan and Ascidian Recruitment and Growth Experiment) program was developed, utilizing a global network of collaborators to examine patterns over a broad geographic scale and a wide range of naturally varying seawater temperatures. This project produced a data set of thousands of photographs from 18 marinas in five countries in summer 2014 and 2015, allowing for recruitment and growth to be tabulated at a variety of temperatures. Thermal growth curves were established for five invasive species, and growth was compared among temperatures across sites, revealing a significant thermal effect. Recruitment was linked to temperature, with generally higher recruitment at warmer seawater temperatures and the highest peak recruitment values for the bryozoan Bugula neritina. Temperature also changed the relative importance of growth and recruitment for several species. These results paint a complex picture of the interactions among invasive fouling species as they relate to seawater temperature.

Offshore structures provide habitat that could facilitate species range expansions and the introduction of non-native species into new geographic areas. Surveys of assemblages of seven offshore oil and gas platforms in the Santa Barbara Channel revealed a change in distribution of the non-native sessile invertebrate Watersipora subtorquata, a bryozoan with a planktonic larval duration (PLD) of 24 hours or less, from one platform in 2001 to four platforms in 2013. We use a three-dimensional biophysical model to assess whether larval dispersal via currents from harbors to platforms and among platforms is a plausible mechanism to explain the change in distribution of Watersipora and to predict potential spread to other platforms in the future. Hull fouling is another possible mechanism to explain the change in distribution of Watersipora. We find that larval dispersal via currents could account for the increase in distribution of Watersipora from one to four platforms and that Watersipora is unlikely to spread from these four platforms to additional platforms through larval dispersal. Our results also suggest that larvae with PLDs of 24 hours or less released from offshore platforms can attain much greater dispersal distances than larvae with PLDs of 24 hours or less released from nearshore habitat. We hypothesize that the enhanced dispersal distance of larvae released from offshore platforms is driven by a combination of the offshore hydrodynamic environment, larval behavior, and larval release above the seafloor.