Two-year survey of Alitta succinea (Annelida: Nereididae) in fouling communities with notes on morphology and reproduction
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1590/Keywords:
Epitoky, Morphometrics, Metamorphosis, pileworm, Population DynamicsAbstract
Alitta succinea (Leuckart, 1847) is an errant segmented worm from the Nereididae family (Annelida) and is broadly distributed around the greater Atlantic basin. A. succinea is a resilient mobile omnivore that plays an important role in connecting lower and upper levels of the food web. Like many other nereidids, A. succinea metamorphoses into reproductive swimming forms, called epitokes, before entering the water column to spawn. In Galveston, Texas the species A. succinea is commonly found in fouling communities attached to artificial structures in marinas. This study presents a two-year survey of a population found in the Texas A&M University at Galveston Boat Basin. Over the two-year period, we collected over 2,000 A.succinea individuals for a gross comparison of population dynamics and morphometrics. During the summer, we found high numbers of small individuals, indicating a primary recruitment period. This was further corroborated by the high number of epitokes in the summer compared to the winter and spring. During the summer and fall, the observed epitokes were significantly smaller than those found in the winter and spring, which supports previous research that shows a positive relationship between temperature and developmental rates. The continual presence of epitokes indicates the existence of a recruitment process that occurs continuously throughout the year. In terms of morphometrics, atokes and epitokes, both females and males, had their own unique profiles. As we expected, epitokes have larger eyes and wider posterior segments compared to atokes. Interestingly, we found females to be significantly larger than males, no matter the season. This study presents.
References
Aguiar, T. M. & Gomes Santos, C. S. G. 2018. Reproductive biology of Alitta succinea (Annelida: Nereididae) in a Brazilian tropical lagoon. Invertebrate Biology, 137(1), 17–28. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ivb.12200.
Bartels-Hardege, H. D. & Zeeck, E. 1990. Reproductive behaviour of Nereis diversicolor (Annelida: Polychaeta). Marine Biology, 106(3), 409–412. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/bf01344320.
Calnan, T. R., Kimble, R. S., Littleton, T. G., Sullivan, J. E. & Fisher, W. L. 1979. Biological analysis of bottom samples-Texas submerged lands.
Cariton, J. T. & Geller, J. B. 1993. Ecological Roulette: The Global Transport of Nonindigenous Marine Organisms. Science, 261(5117), 78–82. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.261.5117.78.
Carpelan, L. H. & Linsley, R. H. 1961. The Spawning of Neanthes succinea in the Salton Sea. Source: Ecology, 42, 189–190.
Clark, R. B. 1961. The origin and the formation of the heteronereis. Biological Reviews, 36(2), 199–236. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-185x.1961.tb01584.x
Detwiler, P. M., Coe, M. F. & Dexter, D. M. 2002. The benthic invertebrates of the Salton Sea: distribution and seasonal dynamics. Hydrobiologia, 473(1/3), 139–160. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1016537903644.
Fernández-Romero, A., Moreira, J. & Guerra-García, J. 2019. Marinas: An overlooked habitat for exploring the relation among polychaete assemblages and environmental factors. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 138, 584–597. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2018.11.064.
Fong, P. P. 1991. The effects of salinity, temperature, and photoperiod on epitokal metamorphosis in Neanthes succinea (Frey et Leuckart) from San Francisco Bay. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 149(2), 177–190. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-0981(91)90044-w.
Gillet, P., Surugiu, V., Vasile, R., Metais, I., Mouloud, M. & Simo, P. 2011. Preliminary data on population dynamics and genetics of Alitta succinea (Polychaeta: Nereididae) from the Romanian coast of the Black Sea. Italian Journal of Zoology, 78(sup1), 229–241. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/11250003.2011.593347.
Hardege, J. D., Bartels-Hardege, H. D., Zeeck, E. & Grimm, F. T. 1990. Induction of swarming of Nereis succinea. Marine Biology, 104(2), 291–295. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/bf01313270.
Hardege, J., Müller, C., Beckmann, M., Bartelshardege, H. & Bentley, M. 1998. Timing of reproduction in marine polychaetes: The role of sex pheromones. Ecoscience, 5(3), 395–404. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/11956860.1998.11682477.
Kersey-Sturdivant, S., Perchik, M., Brill, R. & Bushnell, P. 2015. Metabolic responses of the Nereid polychaete, Alitta succinea, to hypoxia at two different temperatures. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 473, 161–168. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jembe.2015.09.001.
Khalaman, V. V. 2013. Regular and irregular events in fouling communities in the White Sea. Hydrobiologia, 706(1), 205–219. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-012-1432-2.
Kinne, O. 1954. Über das Schwärmen und die Larvalentwicklung von Nereis succinea Leuckart. Zoologischer Anzeiger, 153, 114–126.
Lillie, F. R. & Just, E. E. 1913. Breeding Habits of the Heteronereis Form of Nereis Limbata at Woods Hole, Mass. Biological Bulletin, 24(3), 147–168.
Miyako-Shimazaki, Y., Iwasa, T. & Ohtsu, K. 2005. Ultrastructure and localization of a visual Gq protein in ied epitoke ocelli of Perinereis brevicirris (Polychaeta, Annelida). Cell and Tissue Research, 320(2), 345–354. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00441-004-1070-8.
Ram, J., Fei, X., Danaher, S., Lu, S., Breithaupt, T. & Hardege, J. 2008. Finding females: pheromone-guided reproductive tracking behavior by male Nereis succinea Population survey of an epitokous nereidid Ocean and Coastal Research 2024, v72(suppl 1):e24004 14
Hannon and Schulze in the marine environment. Journal of Experimental Biology, 211(5), 757–765. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.012773.
Ram, J. & Hardege, J. 2005. Nereis succinea nuptial behavior: Does size matter? Invertebrate Reproduction and Development, 48(1–3), 89–94. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/07924259.2005.9652174.
Ram, J., Müller, C., Beckmann, M. & Hardege, J. 1999. The spawning pheromone cysteine‐glutathione disulfide (‘nereithione’) arouses a multicomponent nuptial behavior and electrophysiological activity inNereis succineamales. The FASEB Journal, 13(8), 945–952. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1096/fasebj.13.8.945.
Rasmussen, E. 1973. Systematics and ecology of the isefjord marine fauna (Denmark): With a survey of the eelgrass (zostera) vegetation and its communities. Ophelia, 11(1), 1–507. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00785326.1973.10430115.
Ruiz, G. M., Fofonoff, P. W., Carlton, J. T., Wonham, M. J. & Hines, A. H. 2000. Invasion of Coastal Marine Communities in North America: Apparent Patterns, Processes, and Biases. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 31(1), 481–531. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.31.1.481.
Scheer, B. T. 1945. The Development of Marine Fouling Communities. The Biological Bulletin, 89(1), 103–121. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1538088.
Sette, C. S. C., Shinozaki-Mendes, R. A., Barros, T. L. & Souza, J. R. B. 2013. Age and growth of Alitta succinea (Polychaeta; Nereididae) in a tropical estuary of Brazil. Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, 93(8), 2123–2128. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/s0025315413000854.
Villalobos-Guerrero, T. & Carrera-Parra, L. 2015. Redescription of Alitta succinea (Leuckart, 1847) and reinstatement of A. acutifolia (Ehlers, 1901) n. comb. based upon morphological and molecular data (Polychaeta: Nereididae). Zootaxa, 3919(1), 157–178. DOI: https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.3919.1.7.
Villalobos-Guerrero, T., Conde-Vela, V. & Sato, M. 2021. Review of Composetia Hartmann-Schröder, 1985 (Annelida: Nereididae), with the establishment of two new similar genera. Journal of Natural History, 55(37–38), 2313–2397. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00222933.2021.1976295.
Zeeck, E., Hardege, J. & Bartels-Hardege, H. 1990. Sex pheromones and reproductive isolation in two nereid species, Nereis succinea and Platynereis dumerilii. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 67(2), 183–188.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2024 Ocean and Coastal Research
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Ocean and Coastal Research is an open-access journal available through SciELO (Scientific Electronic Library Online).
Ocean and Coastal Research journal title abbreviation is Ocean Coast. Res. and should be used in footnotes, references, and bibliographic entries.
All Ocean and Coastal Research scientific articles are freely available without charge to the user or institution. In accordance with the BOAI definition of open access, all contents are available to readers free of charge. Users may read, download, copy, and link to the full texts of the articles. They may be used for any lawful purpose without prior authorization from the publisher or the author, as long as proper credit is given to the original publication.
All Ocean and Coastal Research published scientific articles receive an individual Digital Object Identifier (DOI) persistent digital document identification.
All the content of the journal, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons License type BY. Authors retain the copyright and full publishing rights without restrictions.
More information on intellectual property can be found here and on Scielo's Open Acess Statement.
Ocean and Coastal Research is listed in Publons and reviewers and editors can add their verified peer review and editing history to their Publons profile.
Ocean and Coastal Research is indexed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) and complies with principles of transparency and best practice for scholarly publications.
Ocean and Coastal Research is committed to the best standards in open-access publishing by adopting ethical and quality standards throughout the publishing process - from initial manuscript submission to the final article publication. This ensures authors that their work will have visibility, accessibility, reputation, usage, and impact in a sustainable model of scholarly publishing.
