Long-term trends in trait structure of riverine communities facing predation risk increase and trophic resource decline.

Many large European rivers have undergone multiple pressures that have strongly impaired ecosystem functioning at different spatial and temporal scales. Global warming and other environmental changes have favored the success of invasive species, deeply modifying the structure of aquatic communities in large rivers. Some exogenous species could alter trophic interactions within assemblages by increasing the predation risk for potential prey species (top-down effect) and limiting the dynamics of others via resource availability limitation (bottom-up effect). Furthermore, large transboundary rivers are complex aquatic ecosystems that have often been poorly investigated so that data for assessing long-term ecological trends are missing. In this study, we propose an original approach for investigating long-term combined effects of global warming, trophic resource decrease, predation risk, and water quality variations on the trait-based structure of macroinvertebrate and fish assemblages over 26 yr (1985-2011) and 427-km stretch of the river Meuse (France and Belgium). The study of temporal variations in biological, physiological, and ecological traits of macroinvertebrate and fish allowed identifying community trends and distinguishing impacts of environmental perturbations from those induced by biological alterations. We provide evidence, for this large European river, of an increase in water temperature (close to 1°C) and a decrease in phytoplankton biomass (-85%), as well as independent effects of these changes on both invertebrate and fish communities. The reduction of trophic resources in the water column by invasive molluscs has dramatically affected the density of omnivorous fish in favor of invertebrate feeders, while scrapers became the major feeding guild among invertebrates. Macroinvertebrate and fish communities have shifted from large-sized organisms with low fecundity to prolific, small-sized organisms, with early maturity, as a response to increased predation pressure.

Isotopic half-life and enrichment factor in two species of European freshwater fish larvae: an experimental approach.

RATIONALE: Stable isotope ratios of carbon and nitrogen are valuable tools for field ecologists to use to analyse animal diets. However, the application of these tools requires knowledge of the tissue enrichment factor (TEF) and half-life (HL). We experimentally compared TEF and HL in two freshwater fish larvae. We hypothesised that chub had a better growth/tissue replacement ratio than roach, due to the use of a food closer to their natural diet. METHODS: We determined the isotopic HL, the TEF and the contribution of growth or metabolic tissue replacement to dynamic isotopic incorporation. After yolk sac resorption, larvae were fed for 5 weeks with prey similar to their natural diet (Artemia nauplii) up to the isotopic equilibrium followed by Chironomid larvae. Stable isotope measurements were carried out using a continuous flow isotope ratio mass spectrometer coupled to an elemental analyser. RESULTS: Changes in isotopic composition strongly followed the predictions of exponential growth and time-dependent models. The isotopic HL varied between 8.2 and 12.6 days and the TEF of nitrogen and carbon ranged from 1.7 to 3.1 ‰ and from -0.9 to 1.2 ‰, respectively. The incorporation of dietary 13 C was due more to the production of new tissue (between 56 and 79%) than to the metabolic process. Chub allocated more energy to growth than roach and the Chironomidae diet contributed more to the consumers' growth than the Artemia diet. CONCLUSIONS: Metabolic rates seemed lower for chub than for roach, especially when they were fed with Chironomidae. A Chironomidae-based diet would be more profitable to chub, and the high associated growth rate could increase the development of the fish larvae. The HL and TEF were in the range of those reported in the literature. These results will be helpful for field-based studies, because they can help to increase the accuracy of models. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.