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Abstract

Climate change increases the need to control range-extending species, which adversely impact their recipient ecosystem. Increasing populations of resident predators may be effective to counter such range-extension, but only if they consume the novel invaders at sufficient rates. In South-East Australia, poleward range-extending Longspined Sea Urchins (Centrostephanus rodgersii) are causing catastrophic ecological habitat transition to extensive urchin barrens. Tasmanian native Southern Rock Lobster (Jasus edwardsii) is a potential predator that could control further urchin expansion. Experimental feeding trials showed that range-extending Longspined Sea Urchins are the least preferred prey choice for Southern Rock Lobsters (3.8% predation events), when compared to three local species: abalone, urchins, and snails (36.6, 32.6, and 27%). Interestingly, habitat origin and naivete of lobsters to urchins affected urchin consumption with 85% being consumed by lobsters originating from urchin barrens. Low predation rates on Longspined Sea Urchin suggest that resident lobsters are unlikely to control further barren expansion unless a behavioural shift occurs. Results imply that potential control of Longspined Sea Urchins by Southern Rock Lobsters has previously been overestimated. Additional control methods are needed to safeguard ecological communities and important commercial stocks from this climate change-induced, range-extending pest species.

Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Smith, JE and Keane, J and Mundy, C and Gardner, C and Oellermann, M
Keywords:	naive predator, non-native prey, predator-prey, range shift, rock lobster, species redistribution, Tasmania, urchin barrens
Journal or Publication Title:	ICES Journal of Marine Science
Publisher:	Academic Press Ltd Elsevier Science Ltd
ISSN:	1054-3139
DOI / ID Number:	https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsac058
Copyright Information:	© The Author(s) 2022. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of International Council for the Exploration of the Sea.This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Related URLs:	Google Scholar: Keane, J UTAS Profile: Keane, J Google Scholar: Mundy, C UTAS Profile: Mundy, C Google Scholar: Gardner, C UTAS Profile: Gardner, C Google Scholar: Oellermann, M UTAS Profile: Oellermann, M
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