Abstract
Although plant phenotypic plasticity has been historically studied as an important adaptive strategy to overcome herbivory and environmental heterogeneity, there are several aspects of its ecological importance that remain controversial. The burrowing crab Chasmagnathus granulata eats Spartina densiflora, and also causes several geomorphologic changes that indirectly affect Spartina growth. Here we evaluate if this crab affects the sexual reproductive effort of S. densiflora by mediating changes in plant phenotypic plasticity (i.e., shape of leaves and spikes) while affecting aboveground production, and if these effects interact with disturbance intensity. We conducted local and regional surveys and two-year field experiments manipulating the density of crabs in a mature Spartina marsh where we clipped at ground level different 1×1 m marsh areas to create and compare crab's effect on young (plants growing after the clipping) and mature (unclipped) Spartina stands. Our results suggest that crabs mediate the phenotypic plasticity of sexual reproductive structures of Spartina. Crabs induced an increase in seed production (up to 721%) and seed viability, potentially favoring Spartina dispersal and colonization of distant sites. This effect appears to be maximal when combined with the experimental clipping disturbance. Crabs also exerted a strong effect on clipped plants by increasing the number of standing dead stems and decreasing the photosynthetic area and leaf production. These effects disappear in about two years if no other disturbance occurs. An a posteriori regional field survey agreed with our experimental results corroborating the prediction that plants in old undisturbed marshes have lower sexual reproductive effort than plants in highly disturbed marshes populated by burrowing-herbivore crabs. All these phenotypic changes have important taxonomic and macro-ecological implications that should not be ignored in discussions of applied ecology and environmental management.
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