BENTHOS RESPONSE TO DISTURBANCE IN WESTERN LAKE ERIE - FIELD EXPERIMENTS

Open space (defaunated sediment) was provided on the floor of Lake Erie on 11 occasions. A consistent succession of functional and adaptive types was observed. Early colonizers - the ostracod Physocypria globula, the naidid oligochaete Vejdovskyella intermedia, and the chironomid, Chironomus plumosus - exceeded their natural bottom abundances by 2-7 × within 40 d, but decreased in abundance later. They are small and mobile, live and feed close to the sediment-water interface, and reproduce often. Late colonizers - Limnodrilus spp., Ilyodrilus templetoni, and pisidiid bivalves - reached natural abundances only after several months if at all. They are large, deep infaunal dwellers that grow slowly and reproduce late in life. An intermediate group - Arcteonais lomondi, Specaria josinae, Pristina acuminata, Dero digitata, Procladius sp., and Coelotanypus sp. - reached their natural abundances early but did not exceed them. -from Authors