Intertidal Community Ecology
Research focuses on top-down/bottom-up community dynamics on rocky intertidal meta-ecosystems at scales ranging from single sites to the entire US west coast. We use observations, measurements and experiments to understand the impacts of inputs of ecological subsidies (nutrients, propagules and particulates such as detritus and phytoplankton), species interactions, environmental stress, and ocean conditions in determining community structure. We quantify recruitment of invertebrates using larval collectors. Taxa of interest in this sampling program include barnacles, crabs, sea stars, sea urchins and mussels. We use the comparative-experimental approach, which involves running identically designed field experiments at multiple sites, to test consumer-resource, competitive, and facilitative species and functional group interactions. Current research includes geographic-scale investigation of the consequences of sea star wasting on intertidal communities in Oregon and California, recovery of sea star populations from wasting, and impacts of ocean acidification on different life history stages of intertidal invertebrates. Monitoring research focuses on change in community structure and dynamics, recruitment, predation rate, predation effects, mussel growth, mussel bed disturbance, resilience of algal assemblages, and reproductive output of sea stars. Our long-term research has time series data on most of the above factors as long as 20 to 30 years, extending back to the 1980s
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