Territorial and roving grazing fishes farm, and feed on, algae, sediment, or detritus, thus exerting different influences on benthic community structure, and are common clients of cleaner fish. Whether cleaners affect grazing-fish diversity and abundance, and indirectly the benthos, was tested using reefs maintained free of the bluestreak cleaner wrasse Labroides dimidiatus for 8.5 yr (removals) compared with controls. We quantified fish abundance per grazing functional group, foraging rates of roving grazers, cleaning rates of roving grazers by L. dimidiatus, reef benthos composition, and fouling material on settlement tiles. Abundances of 'intensive' and 'extensive' territorial farmers, non-farmers, parrotfishes and Acanthurus spp. were lower on removal than control reefs, but this was not the case for 'indeterminate' farmers and Ctenochaetus siriatus. Foraging rates of Acanthurus spp. and C. striatus were unaffected by cleaner presence or cleaning duration. This suggests some robustness of the grazers' foraging behaviour to loss of cleaners. Acanthurus spp. foraged predominantly on sediment and detritus, whereas C. striatus and parrotfishes grazed over algal turfs. Nevertheless, benthic community structure and amount of organic and inorganic material that accumulated over 3.5 mo on tiles were not affected by cleaner presence. Thus, despite greater abundances of many roving grazers, and consequently higher grazing rates being linked to the presence of cleaners, the benthos was not detectably affected by cleaners. This reveals that the positive effect of cleaners on fish abundance is not associated with a subsequent change in the benthos as predicted. Rather, it suggests a resilience of benthic community structure to cleaner-fish loss, possibly related to multiple antagonistic effects of different grazer functional groups. However, losing cleaners remains a problem for reefs, as the lack of cleaning has adverse consequences for fish physiology and populations.

中文翻译：

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清洁鱼Labroides dimidiatus对食草鱼类和珊瑚礁底栖动物的影响

地域性和流动性放牧鱼类养殖并以藻类、沉积物或碎屑为食，从而对底栖群落结构产生不同的影响，是清洁鱼类的常见客户。清洁剂是否会影响食草鱼类的多样性和丰度，并间接影响底栖动物，使用与对照相比保持 8.5 年（去除）无蓝条纹清洁剂濑鱼 Labroides dimidiatus 的珊瑚礁进行测试。我们量化了每个放牧功能组的鱼类丰度、流动食草动物的觅食率、L. dimidiatus 对流动食草动物的清洁率、珊瑚礁底栖动物组成和定居砖上的污垢材料。丰富的“集约化”和“粗放”领土农民、非农民、鹦嘴鱼和棘鱼属。去除率低于对照珊瑚礁，但“不确定”的情况并非如此 农民和 Ctenochaetus siriatus。Acanthurus spp. 的觅食率 和 C. striatus 不受清洁剂存在或清洁持续时间的影响。这表明食草动物的觅食行为对清洁剂的损失具有一定的稳健性。棘鱼属 主要在沉积物和碎屑上觅食，而 C. striatus 和鹦嘴鱼则在藻类草皮上吃草。然而，在瓷砖上累积超过 3.5 个月的底栖群落结构和有机和无机材料的数量不受清洁剂存在的影响。因此，尽管许多巡回食草动物的数量更多，因此与清洁剂的存在有关的更高的放牧率，但底栖动物并未受到清洁剂的明显影响。这表明清洁剂对鱼类丰度的积极影响与预测的底栖生物的后续变化无关。相反，它表明底栖群落结构对清洁鱼损失的恢复能力，可能与不同食草动物功能群的多重拮抗作用有关。然而，失去清洁剂对珊瑚礁来说仍然是一个问题，因为缺乏清洁会对鱼类生理和种群产生不利影响。