Mya arenaria and Mercenaria mercenaria predator-prey dynamics

R code and data sets support/recreate all analysis in the following manuscript: Glaspie, C.N. and Seitz, R.D. Habitat complexity and benthic predator-prey interactions in Chesapeake Bay. Submitted to PLOS ONE. We examined the potential for habitat and predators to drive densities and distributions of bivalves in a field caging experiment (Mya arenaria) and laboratory mesocosm experiments (Mya arenaria and Mercenaria mercenaria). A caging study was conducted with juvenile Mya in patchy seagrass, sand, and mud near-shore habitats (1.5-2 m depth mean high water) in May 2014 near the mouth of the York River, VA (between 37.258323, -76.428047 and 37.275197, -76.370150). Cages were designed to elucidate the impacts of major predators, including blue crabs Callinectes sapidus and cownose rays Rhinoptera bonasus. Mya (thin-shelled deep infaunal) and Mercenaria (armored shallow infaunal) were exposed to blue crab C. sapidus predation in mesocosm tanks of 0.87 m diameter and 0.59 m height. For half of the trials (n = 3 for each treatment) predator behavior was recorded using an infrared-sensitive camera system. Metadata for all files in this data package can be found in the metadata.txt file.