SGER: Linking Physiological Performance to Population Demography in a Temperate Reef Fish

人们对生理过程及其对个体和种群的生态影响之间的联系知之甚少，尽管有人提出这种联系可能会产生重要的后果。生理学家和生态学家都强调有必要将生理学和种群生态学结合起来，分别解释招聘成功的差异和生理条件的生态相关性。为此目的而设计的实验从未发表过，甚至可能也没有尝试过。该项目的目标是将生理表现与温带珊瑚鱼最近的定居者生存结合起来，这是一种名叫Paralprar x clathratus的海藻。将采用一种新的方法，在海底放置专门建造的潜水式泳道，现场测量游泳性能和代谢率，然后将鱼放在实验海带床上，然后记录捕食者诱导的死亡率。这种方法的目的是在记录生理测量时尽可能减少任何压力的影响。海带鱼很容易固定在悬浮在水柱中的塑料网状物上。完全在水下潜水工作，将从这些设备中收集鱼，放在附近驻扎的泳道中，测量游泳成绩和代谢率，用弹性体(彩色硅胶)单独标记鱼，然后释放到在沙底建造的小型实验海带床。将在2-3周内对有标记的鱼进行监测，以确定较老的同种鱼的死亡率是否与先前测量的个体游泳成绩或代谢率相关。

Links between physiological processes and their ecological implications to individuals and populations are poorly understood despite suggestions that such links may have important consequences. Both physiologists and ecologists underscore the need to couple physiology and population ecology in explaining variation in recruitment success and the ecological relevancy of physiological condition, respectively. Experiments designed for this purpose have never been published or possibly even attempted. The goal of this project is to couple physiological performance with the survival of recent settlers of a temperate reef fish, the kelp bass Paralabrax clathratus. A novel approach will be employed in which specially constructed submersible swim tunnels will be positioned on the sea bottom for in situ measurements of swimming performance and metabolic rate, followed by placing fish on experimental kelp beds and subsequently recording predator?induced mortality rate. This approach is meant to reduce as much as possible any effects of stress in recording physiological measurements. Kelp bass settle readily to plastic mesh devices suspended in the water column. Working completely underwater on SCUBA, fish will be collected from these devices, placed in swim tunnels stationed nearby, swimming performance and metabolic rate measured, fish marked individually with elastomer (colored silicone), and then released to small experimental kelp beds constructed on sand bottom. Monitoring of marked fish will be done over a 2?3 week period to determine if mortality from older conspecifics is correlated with previously measured individual swimming performance or metabolic rate.