Universität zu Köln

Moelzner, Jana and Fink, Patrick ORCID: 0000-0002-5927-8977 (2015). Consumer patchiness explained by volatile infochemicals in a freshwater ecosystem. Ecosphere, 6 (3). HOBOKEN: WILEY. ISSN 2150-8925

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Abstract

Many animal species show considerable spatial variation in abundance within their habitats. Since they live in patchy environments where food resources are often heterogeneously distributed, it would be adaptive for them to have efficient chemoreceptive mechanisms to locate food resources over distances. In the current study we investigated whether gastropod consumers perceive and pursue odorant signals in three choice experiments which were conducted under semi-natural conditions. We tested the foraging behavior of freshwater snails to targets containing odorant stimuli and whether the recognition of food finding signals subsequently leads to the aggregation of grazers on the corresponding resource patch. We demonstrate that freshwater gastropods are able to recognize odor bouquets as foraging infochemicals and that grazing of conspecifics causes an aggregation of grazers under natural conditions. Further, they appear to be able to distinguish between high- and low-quality food resources based on resource-quality specific odor bouquets. Our results suggest that the perception of volatile cues is a process relevant on environmental scales and thus a possible mechanism to explain the frequently observed patchy distribution of grazers in ecosystems.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID ORCID Put Code Moelzner, Jana UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Fink, Patrick UNSPECIFIED orcid.org/0000-0002-5927-8977 UNSPECIFIED
URN:	urn:nbn:de:hbz:38-411648
DOI:	10.1890/ES14-00246.1
Journal or Publication Title:	Ecosphere
Volume:	6
Number:	3
Date:	2015
Publisher:	WILEY
Place of Publication:	HOBOKEN
ISSN:	2150-8925
Language:	English
Faculty:	Unspecified
Divisions:	Unspecified
Subjects:	no entry
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Keywords Language TROPHIC INTERACTIONS; LYMNAEA-STAGNALIS; NUTRIENT LIMITATION; ORGANIC-COMPOUNDS; ACHATINA-FULICA; DAPHNIA GROWTH; POND SNAIL; FOOD; MOVEMENT; ATTRACTION Multiple languages Ecology Multiple languages
URI:	http://kups.ub.uni-koeln.de/id/eprint/41164