Trophic Structure in a Seabird Host-Parasite Food Web: Insights from Stable Isotope Analyses
Elena Gómez-Díaz, Jacob González-Solís · 2010
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Description
Elena Gómez-Díaz and Jacob González-Solís mapped a seabird food web in PLOS ONE in 2010. They used chemical tracers, and they included the birds' parasites. Food web studies often leave parasites out, though they are everywhere. Parasites feed in varied ways, making their place in the web tricky. Stable isotope analysis reads diet from tissue chemistry, offering a way in. The team applied it to a seabird colony and its parasites.
Isotopes placed each parasite at a feeding level relative to its host. Some parasites feed higher than expected, effectively preying on predators. Including parasites changes the web's shape and its energy accounting. That matters for predicting how webs respond to species loss. The study argues parasites deserve seats in food web science.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Elena Gómez-Díaz, Jacob González-Solís |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2010 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 37 KB |
| LICENSE | Creative Commons Attribution License |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | PLOS ONE |
Source: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0010454