ABSTRACT
The activity of any organism changes the environment in which it lives as well as the lives of other organisms they interact with. Several categories of species interactions are recognized, among which are competition, predation, and mutualism.
Competition is an interaction in which one organism consumes a resource that would have been available to another one which can occur between the same species or different ones. At the interspecific competition one species suffers a reduction in fecundity, growth, or survivorship as a result of the dispute for the same resource. Predation is an interaction in which one organism eats another, the prey, or only part of its prey, which may then regrow. A mutualistic relationship is one in which organisms of different species interact to their mutual benefit, usually involving the direct exchange of goods or services.
In this chapter the interspecific relationships involving groupers are considered. We will firstly focus on the ecological consequences on ecosystem functioning of the competition due to the groupers. According to their importance in density or biomass, groupers can modify interspecific relationships throughout competition. Predation, and more precisely the description of grouper’s diet, are presented in another chapter (Chapter 1.4, in this book). Finally, we will consider the mutualistic relationship between groupers and other species.
