Aquatic Sciences Meeting, Albuquerque 2001

CS37 Zooplankton

Date: Tuesday, February 13, 2001, Time: 3:00:00 PM

Location: Aztec

Hirst, A, G, Department of Biological Sciences, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, United Kingdom, A.Hirst@hw.ac.uk

Kiorboe, T, , Danish Institute for Fisheries Research, Charlottenlund Castle, DK-2920, Charlottenlund, Denmark, tk@dfu.min.dk

INDIRECT SOLUTIONS TO COPEPOD MORTALITY: GLOBAL RATES AND PATTERNS

Using life history theory we make predictions of mortality rates in marine epi-pelagic copepods from field estimates of adult fecundity, development times, and adult sex ratios. Predicted mortalities are found to be significantly positively correlated with temperature, and negatively correlated with adult body weight in both the broadcast and sac spawners, and our data fit the general mortality scaling pattern found by McGurk (1986). We compare our predicted mortality rates with the few available direct in situ estimates of mortality rates in copepods. The field rates are found to closely follow the predictions of our global model. Finally, by comparing predicted mortality rates with predation-free laboratory rates we are able to make the first calculations of the natural rates of predation mortality, and determine whether these vary as a function of temperature and/or copepod body size.

This Session Listing

Aquatic Sciences Meeting, Albuquerque 2001

Quicklinks