Precision of estimates of phytoplankton growth and microzooplankton grazing when the functional response of grazers may be nonlinear

Abstract

The analysis of dilution experiments for determining rates of phytoplankton growth and microzooplankton grazing needs to be reconsidered. Zooplankton grazing may saturate at high food concentrations, and therefore experimental data should be fitted with models that include this possibility. Such models will fit the data better; as a consequence, they will reveal some of the uncertainty in the rate estimates that linear analysis conceals. We illustrate this point with simulated and real dilution experiments.