Tables and figures:
Figure 1: Images of gnathiids positively identified from gut contents retrieved via dissection of Malacoctenus macropus (Rosy blenny, left) and fecal matter from Elacatinus evelynae(Sharknose ‘Cleaner’ goby, right). Images were captured through a dissection microscope at approximately x40 magnification.
Table 1: Fish families and number of species in each functional group. Average gnathiids per fish (with associated confidence intervals) and percentage of fishes in each group that consumed at least one gnathiid are also included. *does not include unidentified juvenile Labrid wrasse as a separate species, includes unidentified Serranid hamlet as a separate species,does not include unidentified parrotfish as a separate species, §data are from Artim et al. (2017).
Table 2: Model results for the zero-inflated negative binomial regression model showing the significant influence of the functional group (categorical independent variable) on gnathiid count (discrete dependent variable). *denotes a significant difference (p < 0.05) from the reference level, which was the “dedicated cleaner” functional group.
Figure 2: Boxplots depicting gnathiid consumption of all functional groups (A) and the gnathiid consumption of all functional groups excluding those that did not consume a gnathiid (B). The two highest facultative cleaner values are not shown due to the truncated X-axis.
Figure 3: Estimated number of individuals required for a given functional group to replace a single dedicated cleaner. Calculated based on the average gnathiids per gut for each group.
Figure S1: A map of study sites
Table S1: Site level gnathiid consumption for all functional groups.