Ontogenetic shifts in a freshwater cleaning symbiosis: consequences for hosts and their symbionts.

Animal fitness is influenced by diverse assemblages of internal and external symbionts. These assemblages often change throughout host ontogeny, but the mechanisms that underlie these changes and their consequences for host fitness are seldom revealed. Here we examine a cleaning symbiosis between crayfish and an assemblage of ectosymbiotic branchiobdellidan worms to uncover what mechanisms drive changes in symbiont composition during host ontogeny and the consequences of these changes for both the host and symbionts. In surveys of a North Carolina river, the dominant worm species shifted from Cambarincola philadelphicus to Cambarincola ingens as crayfish (Cambarus bartonii) increased in size. We demonstrate that this shift is a function of host regulation by small crayfish and exclusion by a dominant symbiont on large crayfish. In a controlled lab experiment, small crayfish often removed their symbionts but C. ingens was removed at a higher rate than C. philadelphicus. In contrast, C. ingens had higher survivorship and reproduction than C. philadelphicus on large crayfish. We also measured the effect of each worm species on crayfish growth through ontogeny; neither worm species had an effect on small crayfish but both species had similar positive effects on the growth of large crayfish relative to controls. Evidence from another experiment suggested that intraguild predation by C. ingens caused a decline in C. philadelphicus on large crayfish. We have shown that shifts in partner fitness are a function of host size and that these shifts can involve the succession of symbionts. Further, our results suggest that changes in the outcome of symbioses can remain robust throughout host ontogeny despite interactive mechanisms that lead to shifts in symbiont community structure.