The effect of light temperature and salinity on photosynthetic rates of an estuarine cladophora

Abstract

Cladophora occurs throughout the year as free-living, densely-branched spheres in beds on the floor of the Peel Inlet, Western Australia. Short-term experiments on photosynthetic rates with an oxygen electrode show that the plant tolerates wide changes in salinity. Temperatures fall to limiting levels in winter, as do light intensities at the surface of an algal bed. However, even at high light intensities in summer, algae more than 1 cm below the surface of a bed are below the compensation point. Thus light presumably limits rate of dry matter increase in these beds even in summer.