Investigating the Trophic Ecology of the Fish Genus Cyclothone in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre Using Stable Isotope Techniques

The meso- and bathypelagic fish genus Cyclothone, commonly known as bristlemouths, are the most abundant vertebrates on the planet. Despite their abundance, little is known about their trophic ecology. A few studies have used traditional stomach content analysis and found that the majority of individuals had empty stomachs and a few contained copepod and ostracod remains. We used bulk tissue carbon and nitrogen isotopes, and compound-specific nitrogen isotope analysis of amino acids (AA-CSIA) to investigate the trophic ecology of this genus from individuals collected at Station ALOHA, in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre. Two cosmopolitan species were abundant, the shallower living Cyclothone alba (425-625 m) and the deeper living Cyclothone pallida (600 – 1300 m), and appear to have different feeding ecologies. While the bulk ¹³C and ¹⁵N contents of C. alba were similar to those of other zooplanktivorous micronekton, the bulk ¹³C and ¹⁵N contents of C. pallida were much higher than those of zooplanktivorous micronekton and suggest either (1) that they feed at a similar trophic level to large predatory fishes such as Thunnus albacares and Coryphaena hipurrus or (2) that the baseline isotopic values of their food web are substantially different. AA-CSIA showed that the trophic position (TP) of C. pallida was 2.3 - 3.2 (±0.28), that is, much lower than the TP of large predatory fishes. Additionally, the δ¹⁵N values of the ‘source’ amino acid phenylalanine (d¹⁵N_PHE) were very high, indicating baseline isotopic values within the range of bacterially-altered suspended particles. Suspended particles have often been overlooked as a significant source of carbon in the deep sea despite discrepancies between the supply of carbon via sinking particles and estimated demand of carbon by deep sea organisms. These results suggest that a suspended particle based food web is important to at least some deep-sea fauna.