Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Planktonic production fuels the base of marine food webs and can mediate energy accumulation in consumers but is affected by several anthropogenic pressures. Our understanding of how shifts in prey quality at various trophic level shape marine food webs remains poor. This study explores variation in the nutritional quality of prey of hake Merluccius merluccius and whiting Merlangius merlangus between the 2000s and 2020s. An overall decrease in prey quality was observed between these periods. Prey species previously considered high quality no longer differed in nutritional composition from intermediate-quality prey species. These results suggest that a profound trophic reorganization is currently taking place in the Bay of Biscay, probably mediated through bottom-up processes.
Source: Journal of Fish Biology
DOI: 10.1111/jfb.70116
Authors: Morgane Amelot, Marianne Robert, Maud Mouchet, Dorothée Kopp
Institutions: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Ifremer, Sorbonne Université, Institut National de Recherche pour l'Agriculture, l'Alimentation et l'Environnement, Centre d'Écologie et des Sciences de la Conservation, L'Institut Agro, Dynamique et durabilité des écosystèmes : de la source à l'océan
Language: English
Subfield: Global and Planetary Change
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDG: Life below water
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $4,480
OpenAlex ID: W4411463859