Plasticity of trophic interactions in fish assemblages results in temporal stability of benthic-pelagic couplings

This study addresses the temporal variability of couplings between pelagic and benthic habitats for fish assemblages at five periods in a shallow epicontinental sea, Eastern English Channel (EEC). Organic matter fluxes fueling relative contribution their different sources were assessed using stable isotope analysis associated isotopic functional metrics. Couplings realms appeared to be permanent feature EEC, potentially favored by depth driven combination two trophic processes. First, interactions exhibited plasticity revealed resource partitioning. Second, changes composition did not impact benthic-pelagic couplings, as most dominant species generalists during least one time period, allowing complete use available resources. Examining both unweighted biomass-weighted indices was complementary permitted better understanding energy fluxes.