Influence of sediment characteristics on the composition of soft-sediment intertidal communities in the northern Gulf of Mexico.

Kyle E Coblentz,Caz M Taylor,Bryan J Sigel,Jessica R Henkel

doi:10.7717/peerj.1014

Kyle E Coblentz, Caz M Taylor + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.1014

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Abstract

Benthic infaunal communities are important components of coastal ecosystems. Understanding the relationships between the structure of these communities and characteristics of the habitat in which they live is becoming progressively more important as coastal systems face increasing stress from anthropogenic impacts and changes in climate. To examine how sediment characteristics and infaunal community composition were related along the northern Gulf of Mexico coast, we sampled intertidal infaunal communities at seven sites covering common habitat types at a regional scale. Across 69 samples, the communities clustered into four distinct groups on the basis of faunal composition. Nearly 70% of the variation in the composition of the communities was explained by salinity, median grain size, and total organic content. Our results suggest that at a regional level coarse habitat characteristics are able to explain a large amount of the variation among sites in infaunal community structure. By examining the relationships between infaunal communities and their sedimentary habitats, we take a necessary first step that will allow the exploration of how changes in habitat and community composition influence higher trophic levels and ecosystem scale processes.

Highlights

Coastal habitats are among the most productive and threatened on Earth and the benthic infauna, the organisms inhabiting the matrix of sediment of these habitats, are important constituents of the ecosystem
Nearly 70% of variation in the communities between sites was explained by salinity, median grain size, and organic content
The clustering of communities observed in our data is related to coarse habitat characteristics, which are reflected quantitatively by the sediment characteristics measured

Summary

Introduction

Coastal habitats are among the most productive and threatened on Earth and the benthic infauna, the organisms inhabiting the matrix of sediment of these habitats, are important constituents of the ecosystem. The intertidal infaunal communities along the northern Gulf of Mexico coast are relatively understudied (but see Shelton & Robertson, 1981; Rakocinski et al, 1991; Dubois et al, 2009) despite being an important resource for many species, including threatened migratory shorebirds, a variety of fishes and economically important invertebrates (Gloeckner & Luczkovich, 2008; Henkel, Sigel & Taylor, 2012; Hsueh, McClintock & Hopkins, 1992; McTigue & Zimmerman, 1998; Quammen, 1984) The habitats of these communities are experiencing unprecedented geological and anthropogenic changes. Understanding how infaunal communities fit into this framework of change and the potential for larger scale consequences at the ecosystem level requires a baseline understanding of the relationships of communities to their habitats

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