The modes of predation on benthic copepods by fishes

The predation on meiobenthos by the young benthic fishes is a well-known phenomenon in which the harpacticoid copepods take an important part. Many authors tried to describe the modes and to evaluate the impact of this predation and the results obtained show that: - the benthic copepods are essential for the surviving of many species of demersal fishes after the benthic recruitment of the planktonic larvae; - the modes of predation are linked to the morphology of fish jaws and to the size and the mobility of the preys. The faunistic characteristics of the biotope play their part and the same species can have different diets in; relation with its localization. - the evaluation of the impact of the prey-predator relations must take into consideration the diversity of the events which manage the biotope.