Western Society of Naturalists 2020 meeting: a success! Here's my talk!

This weekend I got to participate in the Western Society of Naturalists' 101st meeting! 

It was all online, but I still got to connect with and see many old and new friends. Some of the highlights for me were:

• New mentorship program where I got to meet with lots of other scientists and talk about careers and life
• Trivia night with over 100 trivia questions
• I got to be a judge for the first time since I'm not a student anymore
• Cool digital meeting rooms where you can move around and bump into people to chat (Wonder rooms)
• Many talks are recorded, so I can view them later if I missed them!

Above is a screenshot of a Wonder room. Unfortunately, I didn't think to take a screenshot while the conference was still going, so I'm the only one here (the purple dot), but during the conference there were many other small circle people moving around between the rectangles (rooms). When you get near someone it turns on your camera and microphone and you can see and chat with that person! Anyone can join your circle at any time.

Another excellent bonus of an online conference is that I now have a recording of my talk! Since it's under five minutes long, it's a fantastic way to share my research with a very wide range of people. I think the most technical word I use in here is Nucella, which is just the name of the snail, and there are zero graphs or tables, so hopefully my message is quite accessible! Enjoy!

 

Title: POPULATION VARIATION IN AN INTERTIDAL PREDATOR SHAPES HABITAT STRUCTURE AND COMMUNITY COMPOSITION

Authors: Contolini, G.M.1*; Palkovacs, E.P. 1

1- UC Santa Cruz

Abstract: Population-level trait variation is an important form of biodiversity that can alter community and

ecosystem properties. While recent work shows the ecological importance of population-level trait

variation, few studies describe this for predator-prey interactions, especially for predators

consuming foundational prey. In marine systems, where populations are traditionally viewed as

open and highly connected, much debate exists about the importance of intraspecific trait variation.

Here we test the prediction that intraspecific foraging differences among populations of a marine

intertidal predator (Nucella ostrina-emarginata) differentially alter California mussel bed

communities by altering mussel bed structure. In a nine-month field experiment, we measured

mussel bed structure and community composition within the matrix after treatment with Nucella

from one of three populations. Using a piecewise structural equation model, we identified a

pathway through which Nucella foraging can decrease Shannon diversity within the matrix: larger

drilled mussel size increased remaining mussel size which decreased Shannon diversity. As the

different Nucella populations on average drilled significantly different sizes of mussels, our results

show that intraspecific variation in Nucella foraging can differentially alter mussel bed communities

via changing mussel bed habitat structure. These results support the hypothesis that populationlevel

variation in predators can have community consequences in marine ecosystems.