ArticleZoological letters2015
Depth segregation and diet disparity revealed by stable isotope analyses in sympatric herbivorous cichlids in Lake Tanganyika.
Article in Zoological letters, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.
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Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed.
- Characterizing the trophic ecology of herbivorous coral reef fishes using stable isotope and fatty acid biomarkers.PloS one · 2025Article
- Learning performance is influenced by the social environment in cichlid fishes.Canadian journal of experimental psychology = Revue canadienne de psychologie experimentale · 2020Article
- Gene(s) and individual feeding behavior: Exploring eco-evolutionary dynamics underlying left-right asymmetry in the scale-eating cichlid fishEcology and evolution · 2018Article
- Convergence of gut microbiotas in the adaptive radiations of African cichlid fishes.The ISME journal · 2017Article
- Niche divergence facilitated by fine-scale ecological partitioning in a recent cichlid fish adaptive radiation.Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · 2016Article
- Depth and substratum differentiations among coexisting herbivorous cichlids in Lake Tanganyika.Royal Society open science · 2016Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundLake Tanganyika in the African Great Rift Valley is known as a site of adaptive radiation in cichlid fishes. Diverse herbivorous fishes coexist on a rocky littoral of the lake. Herbivorous cichlids have acquired multiple feeding ecomorphs, including grazer, browser, scraper, and scooper, and are segregated by dietary niche. Within each ecomorph, however, multiple species apparently coexist sympatrically on a rocky slope. Previous observations of their behavior show that these cichlid species inhabit discrete depths separated by only a few meters. In this paper, using carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) stable isotope ratios as markers, we followed the nutritional uptake of cichlid fishes from periphyton in their feeding territories at various depths.
resultsδ(15)N of fish muscles varied among cichlid ecomorphs; this was significantly lower in grazers than in browsers and scoopers, although δ(15)N levels in periphyton within territories did not differ among territorial species. This suggests that grazers depend more directly on primary production of periphyton, while others ingest animal matter from higher trophic levels. With respect to δ(13)C, only plankton eaters exhibited lower values, suggesting that these fishes depend on production of phytoplankton, while the others depend on production of periphyton. Irrespective of cichlid ecomorph, δ(13)C of periphyton correlated significantly with habitat depth, and decreased as habitat depth became deeper. δ(13)C in territorial fish muscles was significantly related to that of periphyton within their territories, regardless of cichlid ecomorph, which suggests that these herbivorous cichlids depend on primary production of periphyton within their territories.
conclusionsCarbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios varied among ecomorphs and among cichlid species in the same ecomorphs sympatrically inhabiting a littoral area of Lake Tanganyika, suggesting that these cichlids are segregated by nutrient source due to varying dependency on periphyton in different ecomorphs (especially between grazers and browsers), and due to segregation of species of the same ecomorph by feeding depth, grazers and browsers in particular.
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