Differential support of lake food webs by three types of terrestrial organic carbon

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Abstract
Organic carbon inputs from outside of ecosystem boundaries potentially subsidize recipient food webs. Four whole‐lake additions of dissolved inorganic 13C were made to reveal the pathways of subsidies to lakes from terrestrial dissolved organic carbon (t‐DOC), terrestrial particulate organic carbon (t‐POC) and terrestrial prey items. Terrestrial DOC, the largest input, was a major subsidy of pelagic bacterial respiration, but little of this bacterial C was passed up the food web. Zooplankton received 20% of their carbon. The results show that impacts of cross‐ecosystem subsidies depend on characteristics of the imported material, the route of entry into the food web, the types of consumers present, and the productivity of the recipient system.