Zooplankton abundance and evidence for its reduction by macrophyte mats in two Orinoco floodplain lakes

Zooplankton populations were sampled over one annual cycle intwo floodplain lakes of the Orinoco River, Venezuela, in anattempt to establish the relationship between abundance patternsand the hydrology and morphometry of the lakes. One of the lakes(Tineo) is relatively large with a gently sloping basin; theother one (Aguilera) is smaller and channel-shaped. The hydraulicresidence time of Lake Aguilera during inundation by the riveris shorter (<1 day) than the minimum generation times ofcrustacean (4–12 days) and rotiferan (2.5 days) zooplankton.For Lake Tineo, residence time during inundation (7 days) islonger than generation times for all taxa except copepods. AlthoughLake Aguilera receives water from Lake Tineo during inundation,zooplankton densities were greatly reduced during passage througha large bed of the floating aquatic grass Paspalum repens locatednear the outlet of Lake Tineo. This retention was not size-selectiveand affected phytoplankton as well as zooplankton. In the Orinocofloodplain zooplankton densities are affected not only by hydraulicresidence times but also by passage of water between lakes,which exposes populations to large losses within macrophytebeds. Retention of plankton by floating macrophyte beds is potentiallyimportant to the trophic ecology of tropical floodplain lakesbecause it results in the concentration of planktonic productionin epiphytic and benthic habitats, where it can readily supportfood webs consisting of macroinvertebrates and fishes. Exportof plankton from floodplain waterbodies to the river is alsoreduced by this mechanism. ¹Present address: Department of Biological Sciences, Universityof California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA