Roles of larval supply and behavior in determining settlement of barnacles in a temperate mangrove forest

Abstract

Recruitment is often a major influence on the spatial distribution of populations of benthic marine invertebrates, but the contributions of different components of recruitment are not well known, with the added complication that the relative importance of various life-history processes may be scale-dependent. Previously, we have shown that over a large scale across a mangrove (Avicennia marina) forest in southeastern Australia, settlement of the barnacle Eliminius covertus explained its patterns of recruitment, which in turn explained the distribution of adults on mangrove pneumatophores. Post-settlement mortality had little influence on this pattern. In contrast, small-scale vertical distri..