DOI: 10.5061/dryad.c213h
title: Data from: Detailed food web networks of three Greater Antillean coral reef systems: the Cayman Islands, Cuba, and Jamaica

description: Food webs represent one of the most complex aspects of community biotic
 interactions. Complex food webs are represented as networks of
 interspecific interactions, where nodes represent species or groups of
 species, and links are predator-prey interactions. This paper presents
 reconstructions of coral reef food webs in three Greater Antillean regions
 of the Caribbean: the Cayman Islands, Cuba, and Jamaica. Though not
 taxonomically comprehensive, each food web nevertheless comprises
 producers and consumers, single-celled and multicellular organisms, and
 species foraging on reefs and adjacent seagrass beds. Species are grouped
 into trophic guilds if their prey and predator links are
 indistinguishable. The data list guilds, taxonomic composition, prey
 guilds/species, and predators. Primary producer and invertebrate richness
 are regionally uniform, but vertebrate richness varies on the basis of
 more detailed occurrence data. Each region comprises 169 primary
 producers, 513 protistan and invertebrate consumer species, and 159, 178,
 and 170 vertebrate species in the Cayman Islands, Cuba, and Jamaica,
 respectively. Caribbean coral reefs are among the world's most
 endangered by anthropogenic activities. The datasets presented here will
 facilitate comparisons of historical and regional variation, the
 assessment of impacts of species loss and invasion, and the application of
 food webs to ecosystem analyses.
description: 857470.item.1Trophic data for the Cayman Islands. Data specify trophic guilds, the number of prey per guild, a list of those prey guilds, and the major foraging habitat of the guild. In the first column is given the Guild Number. Guild numbers are standard among all the datasets; for example, guild number 1 represents planktonic bacteria in the Cayman, Cuban, and Jamaican datasets. In the second column (Guild Description) is given the common language guild descriptions. The descriptions indicate the major trophic niche of the guild in the case of multispecies guilds (e.g., Macroplanktonic carnivores I), the major taxon of the guild (e.g., Eucidaris), or in the case of vertebrates, a common name of the species (e.g., scorpionfish). In the third column (Foraging Habitat) is given the major foraging habitat of vertebrate guild members. In this column, r means reef; rg, reef and seagrass beds; and g, seagrass beds. In the fourth column (Number of Prey) is given the total number of guilds that contain species that are preyed upon by the guild in question. In the fifth column (Prey) is given a list of prey guilds. Missing data are indicated by a period (.).Column 1: Guild Number Column 2: Guild Description Column 3: Foraging Habitat Column 4: Number of Prey Column 5: Prey857470.item.2Trophic data for Cuba. Data specify trophic guilds, the number of prey per guild, a list of those prey guilds, and the major foraging habitat of the guild. In the first column is given the Guild Number. Guild numbers are standard among all the datasets; for example, guild number 1 represents planktonic bacteria in the Cayman, Cuban, and Jamaican datasets. In the second column (Guild Description) is given the common language guild descriptions. The descriptions indicate the major trophic niche of the guild in the case of multispecies guilds (e.g., Macroplanktonic carnivores I), the major taxon of the guild (e.g., Eucidaris), or in the case of vertebrates, a common name of the species (e.g., scorpionfish). In the third column (Foraging Habitat) is given the major foraging habitat of vertebrate guild members. In this column, r means reef; rg, reef and seagrass beds; and g, seagrass beds. In the fourth column (Number of Prey) is given the total number of guilds that contain species that are preyed upon by the guild in question. In the fifth column (Prey) is given a list of prey guilds. Missing data are indicated by a period (.).857470.item.3Trophic data for Jamaica. Data specify trophic guilds, the number of prey per guild, a list of those prey guilds, and the major foraging habitat of the guild. In the first column is given the Guild Number. Guild numbers are standard among all the datasets; for example, guild number 1 represents planktonic bacteria in the Cayman, Cuban, and Jamaican datasets. In the second column (Guild Description) is given the common language guild descriptions. The descriptions indicate the major trophic niche of the guild in the case of multispecies guilds (e.g., Macroplanktonic carnivores I), the major taxon of the guild (e.g., Eucidaris), or in the case of vertebrates, a common name of the species (e.g., scorpionfish). In the third column (Foraging Habitat) is given the major foraging habitat of vertebrate guild members. In this column, r means reef; rg, reef and seagrass beds; and g, seagrass beds. In the fourth column (Number of Prey) is given the total number of guilds that contain species that are preyed upon by the guild in question. In the fifth column (Prey) is given a list of prey guilds. Missing data are indicated by a period (.). Column 1: Guild Number Column 2: Guild Description Column 3: Foraging Habitat Column 4: Number of Prey Column 5: Prey857470.item.4Guild key. This is a list of all guilds present in Dataset Items 1–3 (Tables) and the taxa assigned to those guilds. There is a total of 265 guilds, though none of the regions described contains all those guilds. There are also several guilds or species that are absent from all the regions, but have nevertheless been recorded in the northern Caribbean region, and are likely to be present in undescribed refuges or occasional members of the regions, for example, the tiger shark Galeocerdo cuvieri. In the first column is given the Guild Number; in the second (Taxa), the taxa assigned to guild; in the third (Fish Body Length), the average body size (fork length, cm) of bony and cartilaginous fish species. Maximum body size is recorded if average size is not available. Missing data are indicated by a period (.). In columns 4–6 is shown the presence of vertebrate species in the Cayman Islands, Cuba, or Jamaica indicated by “x”‌ sign. Column 1: Guild Number Column 2: Taxa Column 3: Fish Body Length (cm) Column 4: Cayman Islands Column 5: Cuba Column 6: Jamaica857470.item.5Binary adjacency matrix of the Cayman Islands food web. Rows are predatory guilds and columns are prey. The th element of the matrix is 1 if guild preys upon species in guild , and 0 otherwise. Note that the matrices are therefore asymmetric about the diagonal, and that there are 265 rows representing each guild in the dataset. Taxa that are missing from the food web, for example, the tiger shark Galeocerdo cuvieri, are included as disconnected nodes, that is, rows and columns comprising zero elements only. This is for consistency with future datasets of related regions in which the species might be present.857470.item.6Binary adjacency matrix of the Cuban food web. Rows are predatory guilds and columns are prey. The th element of the matrix is 1 if guild preys upon species in guild , and 0 otherwise. Note that the matrices are therefore asymmetric about the diagonal and that there are 265 rows representing each guild in the dataset. Taxa that are missing from the food web, for example, the tiger shark Galeocerdo cuvieri, are included as disconnected nodes, that is, rows and columns comprising zero elements only. This is for consistency with future datasets of related regions in which the species might be present.857470.item.7Binary adjacency matrix of the Jamaican food web. Rows are predatory guilds and columns are prey. The th element of the matrix is 1 if guild preys upon species in guild , and 0 otherwise. Note that the matrices are therefore asymmetric about the diagonal and that there are 265 rows representing each guild in the dataset. Taxa that are missing from the food web, for example, the tiger shark Galeocerdo cuvieri, are included as disconnected nodes, that is, rows and columns comprising zero elements only. This is for consistency with future datasets of related regions in which the species might be present.