Behavior of a simple plankton model with food-level acclimation by herbivores

The acclimation of herbivores to variation in their phytoplankton food source was expressed mathematically and its effect on phytoplankton, herbivore and nutrient cycles explored with a plankton model. The grazing formulation is a modified version of the function experimentally determined by Mayzaud and Poulet. Their function differs from the traditional Ivlev expression for herbivore grazing in that there is no asymptotic limit to the grazing rate. The steady-state solutions of the phytoplankton-herbivorenutrient model were similar with the two grazing formulations, but the time-dependent behaviour of the two models differed markedly. The model with Ivlev grazing showed oscillations when the grazing pressure was high. The model with acclimated herbivore grazing showed only small, highly damped oscillations as it approached steady state. The latter is more similar to the evolution of plankton trophic levels observed in controlled ecosystem experiments.

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