Biogenic silica in the Posidonia oceanica “matte”, a tool to discover past dynamics of the sponge community

Abstract The skeleton of most Porifera species consists of siliceous spicules that, after the sponge death, persist for a long time in the sediment. The reduced suspension occurring within the meadows of the seagrass Posidonia oceanica makes these habitats a stable deposit for sponge spicules. Spicules trapped into the network of rhizomes progressively buried, named “matte”, represent a sedimentary sequence interpretable on a temporal scale. By means of a vertical corer we collected samples of sediment at 0.5, 1, 1.5 and 2 m depth along the matte profile in order to quantify the amount of biogenic silica used to assess past dynamics of the sponge community in four P. oceanica meadows of the Ligurian sea. The content in biogenic silica was determined by spectrophotometric analysis of the sediments. While at Prelo Bay the values are constant in the core sample, a general decreasing trend with depth was observed in the meadows of Punta Pedale, while in the site of Punta Manara the major amount of silica was found deeper in the matte. The temporal variations of sponge abundance were probably due to historical anthropogenic factors. In the meadow of Bergeggi, BSi concentrations, significantly lower compared to all other sites, were likely caused from inputs from the close Savona harbor and strong bottom currents avoiding spicule deposition.