Spatiotemporal patterns of trophic niche variation within and among species of tropical coastal fishes

Intraspecific niche variation shapes the structure and function of food webs, but we still know little about the magnitude and drivers of trophic variation within species in species-rich communities. Here, we examined how intrinsic (sex and life stage) and extrinsic (locality and season) factors affect the diet composition and trophic niche width of tropical fish species. Specifically, we studied co-occurring species with benthopelagic (Stellifer ericymba, S. melanocheir, S. zestocarus, and Larimus argenteus) and benthic feeding habits (S. strabo, Cathorops manglarensis, Notarius troschelii, and Urotrygon rogersi) on the central Pacific coast of Colombia. Overall, we observed strong spatial and seasonal effects driving variation in the consumption of (i) amphipods, copepods, and decapods for benthopelagic species and (ii) molluscs and polychaetes for benthic species. As expected, we observed little sexual diet variation; however, surprisingly, most species showed little ontogenetic diet..., This data set corresponds to the prey items found in the stomach contents of the fish species analyzed. Each data base contains the locality, season, sex (female, male, indeterminate), size (total length, standard length), and life stage (Adult, Juvenile, indeterminate) of each individual. For each prey item, we provide the specific abundance and weight (to the nearest milligram). , , # Spatiotemporal patterns of trophic niche variation within and among species of tropical coastal fishes

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.18931zd6r](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.18931zd6r)

## Description of the data and file structure

This data set consists of a Stomach_contents_DB.csv file that corresponds to the prey items found in the stomach contents of the several fish species that were obtained from artisanal shrimp-trawl fishery operations in both bays between July 2014 and October 2015 in the outer zones of Buenaventura Bay (BB) and Málaga Bay (MB) on the central Pacific coast of Colombia. We adopted a two-day sampling design to cover two sites in the outer zone of each bay. Sampling was conducted simultaneously (0900-1200 hr) by two groups of researchers. The data file \"Stomach_contents_DB\" contains the data information of seven tropical fish species (i.e., *Stellifer melanocheir, S. zestocarus, S. ericymba*, *S. strabo, Larimus argenteus, C. manglarensis* and *Notarius trosc...