Cole Adam, Denny Mark
Hopkins Marine Station of Stanford University, 120 Ocean View Blvd, Pacific Grove, California 93950.
Hopkins Marine Station of Stanford University, 120 Ocean View Blvd, Pacific Grove, California 93950
Biol Bull. 2014 Aug;227(1):61-7. doi: 10.1086/BBLv227n1p61.
The mussel Mytilus californianus is a dominant competitor for space on wave-swept rocky shores, where it forms dense beds. Byssal threads anchor each mussel both to the substratum and to neighbors, allowing mussels to resist the onslaught of waves. When incident hydrodynamic stress exceeds a mussel's tenacity, the threads are broken, the mussel is dislodged, and a gap is opened in the bed. Here, we show that when groups of contiguous bed mussels experience similar hydrodynamic forces, they collectively have a lower tenacity than when force is applied to a single individual. Lowered group tenacity leads to greater probabilities of dislodgment, with ramifications for community dynamics and species diversity.
加州贻贝是海浪冲刷的岩石海岸上占据空间的主要竞争者，它在那里形成密集的群落。足丝将每个贻贝固定在基质和相邻贻贝上，使贻贝能够抵御海浪的冲击。当入射流体动力应力超过贻贝的韧性时，足丝会断裂，贻贝会被冲走，群落中就会出现一个缺口。在这里，我们表明，当相邻的群落贻贝群体受到相似的流体动力时，它们的集体韧性比单个贻贝受到力时要低。群体韧性降低会导致被冲走的可能性更大，这对群落动态和物种多样性产生影响。
