Predation by introduced fish can magnify the terrestrial arthropod subsidies in mountain lakes

A portion of the terrestrial subsidies to lentic habitats consists of arthropods. In high mountain, originally fishless lakes, terrestrial arthropods are an important seasonal food resource for introduced fish. Here we investigate how brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis) can alter the input of terrestrial arthropods in 10 high mountain lakes contrasting for their stocking history (with and without fish or manipulated for fish eradication). We used a food consumption model to calculate the minimum and maximum number or biomass of arthropods consumed by fish, and we found that they can exceed, by several folds, the number or biomass of arthropods sinking into the lakes, at least under the metabolic rates expected for fish for most of the summer. We interpret this result as an indirect indication that arthropods usually cannot overcome the surface tension at the lake surface and that fish can work as a vector across the water–air interface. We infer that pathways for dead and live arthropods to leave the lakes do exist and fish can transfer into the water column many arthropods whose fate was leaving the lakes, which may have overlooked ecological and conservation implications.