Amplicon sequence variant tables of Donax gouldii microbiomes from Scripps Pier, La Jolla, CA, USA

Predicting how populations and communities of organisms will respond to anthropogenic change is of paramount concern in ecology today. For communities of microorganisms, however, these predictions remain challenging, primarily due to data limitations. Information about long-term dynamics of host-associated microbial communities, in particular, are lacking. In this study, we use well-preserved and freshly collected samples of soft tissue from a marine bivalve host, Donax gouldii, at a single site to quantify the diversity and composition of its microbiome over a decadal timescale. Site-level measurements of temperature, salinity and chlorophyll a allowed us to test how the microbiome of this species responded to two natural experiments – a seasonal increase in temperature and a phytoplankton bloom. Our results show that ethanol-preserved tissue can provide high-resolution information about temporal trends in compositions of host-associated microbial communities. Specifically, we found th...