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Books > Earth & environment > The environment > Applied ecology > Biodiversity
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The Comparative Roles of Suspension-Feeders in Ecosystems - Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop on The Comparative Roles of Suspension-Feeders in Ecosystems, Nida, Lithuania, 4-9 October 2003 (Paperback, 2005 ed.)
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The Comparative Roles of Suspension-Feeders in Ecosystems - Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop on The Comparative Roles of Suspension-Feeders in Ecosystems, Nida, Lithuania, 4-9 October 2003 (Paperback, 2005 ed.)
Series: NATO Science Series: IV:, 47
Expected to ship within 10 - 15 working days
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Animals are a major link between the water column (pelagic) and the
bottom (benthic) habitats in most shallow systems. This coupling is
dominated by active processes such as suspension-feeding in which
the organism actively uses energy to pump water that is then
filtered to remove suspended particles that are consumed while
undigested remains are deposited on the bottom. As a result of this
feeding on and metabolism of particles, the animals excrete
dissolved inorganic and organic waste back into the water column,
and thus, become major components in the cycling and feedback of
essential elements. With relatively high weight specific filtration
rates of 1- 10 liters/hour/gram dry tissue and a propensity to form
large aggregated populations (beds, reefs, schools and swarms),
these organisms can play an important role in regulating water
column processes Although estuarine bivalve molluscs such as
oysters and mussels dominate the suspension-feeder literature,
other groups including plankton and nekton that are found in
estuarine as well as other aquatic systems are also potentially
important removers of suspended particles. Thus, a significant part
of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop focused on
suspension-feeders as controllers of plankton abundance, biomass
and diversity, system metabolism, nutrient cycling and scale
dependency. Systems dominated by suspension-feeders are typically
impacted by human activities including recreation, aquaculture,
human and industrial pollution, and bilge water from shipping.
Suspension-feeders are often impacted by fisheries and
over-exploitation. These impacts commonly result in changes in
ecosystem structure either through the food chain concentration of
harmful substances or diseases, the introduction of alien species
of suspension-feeders, or the instability of suspension-feeders
systems through species displacement or phase shifts in the
dominance between different suspension-feeding components such as
nekton or zooplankton. These issues were addressed near the close
of the workshop along with conclusions and syntheses developed by
the working groups.
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