Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, St. Petersburg, Florida, United States of America.
University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences Brevard County, Florida SeaGrant, Cocoa, Florida, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2024 Jun 12;19(6):e0302433. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0302433. eCollection 2024.
The timing of American horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus) spawning behavior along the coast of Florida (United States) is generally associated with the highest tides during the spring and fall lunar cycles. All Florida estuaries support horseshoe crab populations, but tidal characteristics vary markedly among locations, which may influence the timing of horseshoe crab spawning behavior. The Indian River Lagoon is a large microtidal estuary on Florida's east coast. Given the microtidal nature of the lagoon, it is unclear which environmental factors affect horseshoe spawning. In 2019, volunteers of Florida Horseshoe Crab Watch conducted daily surveys at two sites in the northern Indian River Lagoon during peak spawning months (February-April). During each survey, volunteers counted all spawning horseshoe crabs and recorded environmental variables, including water temperature, air temperature, wind speed, wind direction, salinity, and tide height. We developed a suite of negative-binomial regression models to quantify relationships between the number of spawning horseshoe crabs and environmental factors. Modeling results indicated a positive relationship between onshore wind speed and number of spawning horseshoe crabs. Our study suggests that in the absence of tidal cues, onshore wind speed may be an important driver of horseshoe crab spawning activity in microtidal estuarine systems.
美国佛罗里达州（美国）沿海地区的美洲鲎（Limulus polyphemus）产卵行为的时间通常与春季和秋季月球周期的最高潮汐有关。所有佛罗里达州的河口都支持鲎种群，但地点之间的潮汐特征差异很大，这可能会影响鲎产卵行为的时间。印第安河泻湖是佛罗里达州东海岸的一个大型微潮汐河口。鉴于泻湖的微潮汐性质，尚不清楚哪些环境因素会影响鲎的繁殖。2019 年，佛罗里达鲎观察志愿者在产卵高峰期（2 月至 4 月）在北印第安河泻湖的两个地点进行了每日调查。在每次调查中，志愿者都数了所有产卵的鲎，并记录了环境变量，包括水温、气温、风速、风向、盐度和潮高。我们开发了一套负二项回归模型来量化产卵鲎数量与环境因素之间的关系。建模结果表明，沿海风速与产卵鲎的数量呈正相关。我们的研究表明，在没有潮汐线索的情况下，沿海风速可能是微潮汐河口系统中鲎产卵活动的重要驱动因素。
