Macrofaunal community bioturbation along an estuary gradient
In: Netherlands Journal of Aquatic Ecology. Kluwer Academic Publishers/Netherlands Society of Aquatic Ecology: Bilthoven. ISSN 1380-8427; e-ISSN 2214-7098, more
Also appears in:Meire, P.; Vincx, M. (Ed.) (1993). Marine and estuarine gradients: ECSA 21: Proceedings of the 21st symposium of the Estuarine and Coastal Sciences Association held in Gent, 9-14 september 1991. Netherlands Journal of Aquatic Ecology, 27(2-4). Netherlands Society of Aquatic Ecology: Bilthoven. 496 pp., more
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| Keywords |
Marine/Coastal; Brackish water |
| Abstract |
A multidisciplinary study of the impact of bioturbation on sediment dynamics has been underway for some time at the Plymouth Marine Laboratory. The current programme has been founded upon the careful selection of six sites in the River Tamar, representative of important combinations of physical and biological variables. The paper presents preliminary results illustrating the contrasting importance of the species Nereis diversicolor and Nephtys hombergi as agents of bioturbation, given their different distributions across the six sites. Thus bioirrigation by N. diversicolor increases up the estuary and is greatest in the region of high suspended bed-load due to tidal pumping, where the consequences for chemical exchange processes between sediments and the water column may be most important. The sediment mixing effects of N. hombergi are likely to be greater towards the seaward end of the estuary but ultimately the particular sediment types and the macrofaunal communities they support dictate the level of bioturbation in ways that do not necessarily relate to simple axial gradients along the estuary . |
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