Muddy sand shores Image Joint Nature Conservation Committee -
View across a cockle strand (biotope LMS.Pcer). Image width
foreground ca 10 m. Image copyright information Ecological and
functional relationships Intertidal sand and mudflats are
invaluable in supporting predator communities (Elliot et al.,
1998). Large mobile epibenthic predators such as bottom-feeding
fish, crabs and birds are important predators in marine soft-
bottom communities and they are important regulators of species
abundance (Ambrose, 1984). Exclosures set up on sandy and muddy
flats in the Wadden Sea revealed that the removal of predation
by shore crabs, shrimps, gobies, flatfish and birds led to a
marked increase in the species diversity and the abundance of
infaunal species (Reise, 1978). The following ecological
relationships are likely. Mobile epifauna including crabs (e.g.
Carcinus maenas) and shrimps (e.g. Crangon crangon) take small
bivalves, polychaetes and crustacea. Carcinus maenas and Crangon
crangon significantly reduce po