Exogenous control of the feeding activity in the invasive Asian shore crab Hemigrapsus sanguineus (De Haan, 1835)

Nicolas Spilmont,Moâna Gothland,Laurent Seuront

doi:10.3391/ai.2015.10.3.07

Abstract

The Asian shore crab Hemigrapsus sanguineus (De Haan, 1835) is an invasive decapod along the coast of the English Channel and the North Sea where it is displacing the indigenous European green crab Carcinus maenas. Although behavioural traits have been identified as a critical component of invasion success, they remain poorly studied in H. sanguineus. Hence, the present study quantitatively assessed the feeding activity of H. sanguineus in the laboratory under different light and starvation conditions. Non-starved H. sanguineus exhibited an exogenous day-night rhythm driven by a photophobic behaviour. Starved individuals lacked the photophobic behaviour, which may allow H. sanguineus to spend more time foraging than species characterised by true endogenous rhythms. Altogether, the foraging behaviours reported in this work highlight the behavioural flexibility and adaptive nature of this species, which may confer to H. sanguineus a competitive advantage in intertidal environments.

Highlights

The combined effect of climate change and alienspecies introduction is a key driver of biodiversity loss (Occhipinti-Ambrogi 2007; Mainka and Howard 2010)
Adaptive behavioural traits appear to have an important role in this invasion success (Holway and Suarez 1999; Weis 2010) and this behavioural plasticity has been termed the ‘adaptive flexibility hypothesis’ (Wright et al 2010)
Our results show that this species exhibits a nonendogenous day-night rhythm, since it fed more actively in dark conditions, either during the day or at night (Figure 1); this basic photophobic behaviour may constitute an adaptive advantage for H. sanguineus as an invasive species when competing with species characterised by endogeneous rhythms

Summary

Introduction

The combined effect of climate change and alienspecies introduction is a key driver of biodiversity loss (Occhipinti-Ambrogi 2007; Mainka and Howard 2010). Crustaceans are considered to be one of the most successful groups of aquatic invasive species (Hänfling et al 2011). Crabs (i.e. brachyuran and ‘crab-like’ anomouran decapods) are successful in estuarine and marine environments, with 73 species known to occur outside of their native ranges (Brockerhoff and McLay 2011). A combination of biological and physiological characteristics (eurytolerance, omnivory, and life-history traits; Hänfling et al 2011) are thought to explain their success. Adaptive behavioural traits appear to have an important role in this invasion success (Holway and Suarez 1999; Weis 2010) and this behavioural plasticity has been termed the ‘adaptive flexibility hypothesis’ (Wright et al 2010)

Objectives

Methods

Results

Conclusion