What is the Limnotron facility?
The Limnotron facility, located in the Biodiversity Institute of Ontario (University of Guelph), houses an array of large tanks (beer vats from Sleeman!) that support temperature- and light-controlled, aquatic mesocosms. Each mesocosm tank consists of a double-walled cylindrical stainless steel tanks of a capacity of 24 000L and measures 5 m in height and 4 m in diameter.
Each tank has a total of 18 different sampling ports from which water samples can be taken. Vertically, sampling ports are located at 6 different levels and are aligned with temperature sensors. Horizontally, each set of 6 vertically-stratified ports are connected to pipes probing into the tank at lengths of 25 cm (short), 50 cm (medium), and 100 cm (long pipes) from the outside of the tank wall. |
Few studies simultaneously measured the distribution and abundance of consumers and resources over space and time and their relations to intrinsic and extrinsic factors. In the Limnotron, we conducted a replicated large scale experiment to test the effects of a pulse nutrient enrichment with three different levels of nutrients on the spatio-temporal distribution in abundance of a simple consumer-resource system (a rotifer; Brachionus calyciflorus and a unicellular algae; Chlorella vulgaris).
So far, this experiment provides one of the first replicated empirical evidence of the effect of trophic interactions on consumer-resource distribution and dynamics in both time and space. Whereas the spatial aspects of these dynamics are often ignored in experimental studies, our results highlight the potential for complex spatial interactions between aquatic consumer-resource resource systems (Turgeon et al. in prep.). |