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Mesograzers are defined as small invertebrate herbivores less than 2.5 cm in length (i.e., 1 inch), and can include juveniles of some larger species. The feeding behaviour of these small invertebrate herbivores is what classifies them as mesograzers. They are commonly found abundantly on Microalgae, Seagrass beds, Giant Kelp, and Coral reefs globally, since these are their main food sources and habitats. Their foraging behaviour is grazing on the organism they are living on, where there are typically masses reaching tens of thousands of mesograzers per meter of habitat. They experience predation from micro-carnivorous fish that help regulate the population of kelp and other common food sources of mesograzers by controlling the population of mesograzers; consequently, grazing is an important process linking aquatic vegetation to higher trophic level. Mesograzers show important top-down effect on marine communities, depending on the diversity and presence of predators. Mesograzers are typically overlooked in scientific research however their foraging effects have been suggested to have extreme effects on the population of their common food sources. They both positively and negatively affect macroalgal performance and productivity trough grazing on algal (i.e., negative effect), or through removing epiphytes (i.e., positive effects). Mesograzers typically exist in spaces lacking enemies by inhabiting, therefore consuming, marine vegetation which are defended against more mobile, larger consumers through Chemical defenses.

Mesograzers are quite common in the marine environment, common examples of mesograzers are small Gastropoda, Amphipoda, Isopoda, and small Crustaceans.

Diet

Sea grass washed ashore by irvin calicut

Giant kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera) holdfast torn from the bottom by a storm. California Channel Islands NMS.

Mesograzers consume a variety of marine vegetation. They typically use the same marine plant as both their habitat and food source. Many mesograzers have been found on sea grass beds. They are also quite known for destroying large populations of giant kelp, as this is another popular source for mesograzers. Other common food sources of mesograzers are coral reefs and macroalgal. They can be found living and feeding on these marine plants worldwide. Mesograzers have even been shown to consume invasive species of microalgae.

Ecological Role of Mesograzers

There is little understanding of mesograzers ecological role. Examination of mesograzer outbreaks in natural, as well as aquacultural settings suggests that they have the potential to alter the abundance of algal. However, the rarity of such events infers that the impact of mesograzers is more than likely insignificant. Nonetheless, observations alone are not significant enough to quantify their ecological role. Many researchers have tried to determine community-wide effects of mesograzers in laboratory studies. This has proven to be difficult due to high spatial and temporal variation in the density of mesograzers, variation in feeding behaviour, along with variable relationships between plant fitness and mesograzers consumption rates. These factors make it difficult to replicate a mesograzers natural environment in a laboratory setting. This difficulty lends to the low understanding of mesograzers ecological role in marine communities. The strongest evidence for mesograzers altering a marine community thus far demonstrates the ability of mesograzers to limit populations of algal epiphytes, which in turn shows benefits for sea grass. However, there is a high need for further field research in this area.

Mesograzers in Gastropods

Dorsal view of Elysia clarki on the algal food source Penicillus capitatus. The scale bar is 5 mm.

Grazing herbivorous gastropods are known as mesograzers. They are commonly known to graze upon epilithic microalgae on rocky shores. The grazing gastropods in these regions are exposed to daily exposure to air, as well as immersion in seawater, due to the tides. Intertidal grazing gastropods can therefore get their food from epilithic microalgae and planktonic microalgae deposited during the tidal shift. However, they obtain most of their food by grazing on the microalgae on the rock surface. The algae availability along with feeding capability will determine the diets of the gastropod grazers on rocky shores. Different gastropod grazers with varying Radula morphology are known to use the same food source. A possible explanation is that the gastropods may find differentiating between the various types of microalgae in their environment quite difficult.

The marine vegetation consumed by grazing gastropods occasionally produces chemical deterrents to prevent mesograzers from feeding on them. Different gastropod grazers elicit different plant responses.

Mesograzers in Crustaceans

Many crustacean species depend largely on animals as their food source, however others feed on pure algal diets (e.g., cyclopoid). Different species of cyclopoid have various mouth parts. This affects if they are grazers or predators, and if grazers, what vegetation they will prefer to graze on. Temperature also has an effect on the grazing behaviour of certain small crustaceans. The relationship between algal and grazer typically shifts with the seasons.

Eurydice affinis Marine isopod from the Belgian Continental Shelf 2003. Camera mounted on a Zeiss Stemi C-2000 binocular microscope. Length: ~3 mm.

Isopoda

Isopoda are an order of crustacean commonly known as mesograzers, due to their general small size and grazing herbivorous feeding behaviour. The mechanisms affecting their habitat choice and grazing in sea grass meadows is affect by the latitude. For isopod grazers, food type is considered a universal mechanism in determining the presence of these grazers on sea grass meadows. Food is more important than shelter, in the absence of predators, regarding habitat choice. Many factors, such as food quality, location, predation, plant morphology, and physiology of the isopod affect food, thus habitat choice. Isopod grazers typically respond to substances excreted by their food source, particu00larly epiphytes alone do not attract isopods (e.g., snails).

Amphipoda

Amphipoda are an order of crustacean that typically graze on algae, considering them mesograzers. Due to global stressors, the population main food sources for amphipods, such as algae, have seen some fluctuation. To ensure they are feeding on the best algae, amphipods have many strategies to picking algae to graze on. To optimize their diet they choose the most nutritive algae, or they increase their consumption rate and/or absorption efficiency while grazing on less nutrient rich algae. These amphipod mesograzers use their host vegetation as both food and habitat, therefore the extent of their impact on benthic communities is related to patterns of host use by these consumers. Food and shelter have been defined as the main factors determining these amphipod’s host.

Finalize Topic/Find Sources

I plan to write me article on "Mesograzer's". This is technically already a stub article on Wikipedia however it only contains 1 sentence. I plan to add a brief, yet informative introduction, explaining what exactly a mezograzer is, what they do, where they are located, etc. Along with this, I plan to discuss each of these topics mentioned in my introduction (example: where they are typically found, their typical behaviours such as courtship and foraging, etc) more in detail further into the article in their own sections. Basically this article needs to be started from scratch. The sources I plan to use for this article are listed below:

Bibliography:

Bellgrove, A., Monk, J., and Quinn, G. (2014). Effects of micro- and mesograzers on intertidal macroalgal recruitment. Marine Biology, 161, pp. 1207-1216. DOI: 10.1007/s002277-014-2411-0

Patane, I., Iachini, T., Farne, A. and Frassinetti F. (2016). Disentangling action from social space: tool-use differently shapes the space around us. PLOS One, 11, DOI: 10.1371/journal

Cruz-Rivera, E., Petsche, C. and Hafez, T. (2017). Detecting sex-related differences in mesograzers feeding experiments: An often overlooked source of intraspecific variation in herbivory. Limnology and Oceanography: Methods, 15, pp. 542-553. DOI: 10.1002/lom3.10179

Machado, G., Siqueira, S. and Leite, F. (2017). Abundance, performance, and feeding preference of herbivorous amphipods associated with a host alga-epiphyte system. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 486, pp. 328-335. DOI: 10.1016/j.jembe.2016.10.030

Author, M., Davenport, A., Anderson, T. and Anderson1, T. (2007). Positive indirect effects of reef fishes on kelp performance: The importance of mesograzers. Ecology Society of America, 88, pp. 1548-1561.

Macaya, E., Rothausler, E., Thiel, M., Molis, M. and Wahl, M. (2005). Induction of defenses and within-alga variation of palatability in two brown algae from the northern-central coast of Chile: Effects of mesograzers and UV radiation. Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 325, pp. 24-227. DOI: 10.1016/j.jembe.2005.05.004

Duggins, D., Eckman, J., E., Siddon, C., E. and Klinger T. (2001). Interactive roles of mesograzers and current flow in survival of kelps. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 223, pp. 143-155. DOI: 10.3354/meps223143

Poore, A., Campbell, A. and Steinberg, P. (2009). Natural densities of mesograzers fail to limit growth of macroalgae or their epiphytes in a temperate algal bed. Journal of Ecology, 97, pp. 164-175. DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2745.2008.01457.x

Article Evaluation

I am evaluating the article on "Nuptial Gifts"

After reviewing some of the citations in the introductory paragraph of this article i have noticed they are not very strong. A few citations do work, they are from credible sources, and are not out dated. However, many of the citations were quite out dated, and some links did not work at all. This being said, the citations that were up to date and reliable were excellent citations, and did provide information relevant to the article.

This article did a good job on giving an overview of what a nuptial gift is and why it occurs, however i did find a few aspects distracting. The main portion of the article is focused on the different nuptial gifts that certain species give. This section seemed very repetitive and drifted from the main point of the article in my opinion.

This article seems fairly neutral with it's information, however the heavy focus on invertebrates nuptial gifts was heavily represented. I understand it is more common for an invertebrate species to give/receive a nuptial gift than a vertebrate species but there are 10 examples of invertebrate nuptial gifts and only 1 vertebrate example.

This article seems fairly neutral in its presentation of nuptial gifts and how they evolved with the species.

All facts are referenced, however some citation links are flawed and are no longer active. This can be an issue for the validity of a citation. Many of the working citations come from academic journals which are neutral resources.

Some information is quite out of date, one of the citations is from the 1940's. In science we are constantly learning new information so a source from that far back in the past is more than likely far to outdated to be reliable now.

In the talk page of this article the discussion is fairly negative. Most comments refer to the dislike of the articles layout as it is a bit confusing. There have also been comments towards the questionable referencing of the article. This article was also nominated for deletion on April 29th 2012.

This article is part of two projects, WikiProject Ecology, and WikiProject Animals. The article has been rated as "start-class" on the quality scale fr the WikiProject Ecology, and "high-importance" on the importance scale. In the WikiProject Animals, this article was rated "start-class" on the project's quality scale and has not yet been rated on the importance scale.

I feel as though this article has great potential and is discussing an important topic in animal behaviour. Some work needs to be done to the referencing and structure of the article however the writing is easy to read and non bias. This is a great start to an important discussion!