Recently, it has been reported that freshwater browning has less effect on planktonic invertebrate abundances than would be expected from current knowledge regarding of the biochemical activity of dissolved organic matter. It may be that the weak responses of whole communities to browning are masked because the individual mitigating strategies of community components have disparate demographic consequences. To examine the above hypothesis, individual-, population- and community-level responses of freshwater invertebrates to varying concentrations of terrestrial dissolved organic matter (tDOM) were investigated. Common cladocerans of the Chydoridae family, Chydorus sphaericus and Acroperus harpae, were used in the experiment which revealed that species employed different strategies to cope with tDOM. C. sphaericus maintained high production of asexual offspring at the cost of individual body growth, so any decreases in the population sizes were not observed. A. harpae, conversely, invested mainly in the production of resting eggs and increased survivability, which resulted in smaller populations. Invertebrate communities showed similar resilience and temporal stability across tDOM concentrations. Therefore, the influence of tDOM was apparently negligible at community level, since the effects of the mitigating strategies of the two species complemented one another. This experiment showed that symptoms of freshwater browning might be difficult to observe at population and community level due to effective mitigating strategies performed at the level of individuals. The effects of browning on freshwater invertebrates might be better considered in the context of alterations in the demographic rates together constituting life-cycle strategies to maintain species survival.

最近，据报道，淡水褐变对浮游无脊椎动物的丰度的影响小于对溶解有机物的生化活性的最新认识。可能是因为整个社区对褐变的弱反应被掩盖了，因为社区组成部分的个体缓解策略具有不同的人口后果。为了检验上述假设，研究了淡水无脊椎动物对不同浓度的陆地溶解有机物（tDOM）的个体，种群和社区水平的反应。在Chydoridae家庭的共同枝角类，Chydorus球形和Acroperus harpae在实验中使用，表明物种采用了不同的策略来应对tDOM。球形隐球菌以个体生长为代价维持了无性后代的高产，因此未观察到种群数量的任何减少。哈尔滨曲霉相反，主要投资于生产静息卵和提高生存能力，这导致人口减少。无脊椎动物群落在tDOM浓度范围内表现出相似的复原力和时间稳定性。因此，tDOM在社区一级的影响显然可以忽略不计，因为这两个物种的缓解策略的效果是相辅相成的。该实验表明，由于在个体层面上采取了有效的缓解策略，在人口和社区层面上可能难以观察到淡水褐变的症状。在人口比率变化共同构成维持物种生存的生命周期策略的背景下，可以更好地考虑褐变对淡水无脊椎动物的影响。