Date of Award

Spring 5-20-2016

Document Type

Undergraduate Honors Thesis

Department

Environmental and Ocean Sciences

Advisor

Dr. Nathalie Reyns

Abstract

Barnacles act as model species for understanding how larval transport processes influence settlement and adult population dynamics. Settlement of barnacle larvae was quantified in the Southern California intertidal from April 2014 through January 2015 and from April through December 2015. Settlement plates (PVC, ~1.9 cm2) were deployed daily at 12-14 locations within our study site in the Bird Rock, La Jolla, California intertidal. Time series of temperature and significant wave height was also collected within the study site. We compared temporal patterns in settlement with changes in temperature and significant wave height. In general, settlement was higher in spring-summer months when compared to fall-winter periods during both years, but greater overall settlement occurred in 2014. In addition, settlement was quantified spatially by graphing the average proportion of settlement that occurred at each plate for the 4 different sampling periods. Spatially analyzing barnacle settlement provides insight into how larval transport processes affect barnacle population dynamics within the rocky intertidal.

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