LARVAL HATCHING, SELF-RECRUITMENT, AND POPULATION CONNECTIVITY IN NEOHELICE GRANULATA

EMILIANO H. OCAMPO; SPIVAK EDUARDO D.

Neohelice granulata, a Model Species for Studies on Crustaceans.

Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Lugar: Cambridge; Año: 2019; p. 85 - 104

Embryonic development is coordinated with some oscillatory events innature which result in hatching of larvae at nocturnal high tides, preferablyduring large-amplitude tides. In this manner, larvae might use theoutflowing ebb tide transport to leave the spawn area, avoidingphysiological stress and high predation risk characteristic of the parentalsites. After the larval development takes place, megalopae return tobenthic habitat by taking advantage of the incoming current during floodtides. Once there, megalopae settle in mudflat or saltmarsh habitat.Exportation of larvae has been observed in Mar Chiquita while in BahiaBlanca the whole cycle takes place inside of the estuary and both retentionand exportation seems to occur in Samborombón Bay. Differences inphysical conditions, particularly salinity, of those habitats seem to explain the plasticity in larval strategies. Importantly, larvae in this species remainnear the natal populations, and they do not integrate the multi-populationpelagic pool anticipated by Giménez (2003). Instead, larvae appear torecruit mainly in the same source population from which they hatch, asevidenced by both the deep genetic population structure and field data.