Coastal habitats in many areas of the world are becoming increasingly degraded.
A major aspect of this degradation is the loss of extensive areas of seagrass, with potentially important consequences for species living in or near these seagrasses.
To understand how these species will be affected, it is important to determine what microhabitats they use, and why they use them.
Because M. latisulcatus is generally found over unvegetated substrates, we hypothesised that they actively selected this habitat.
In addition, if this choice was driven by the need to avoid predators, selection should be intensified in the presence of predators.
Alternatively, there may be no selection, but prawns in vegetated areas are exposed to higher rates of predation, reducing their abundance relative to unvegetated areas.
Prawn size might also play an important role in the choice of habitat if small individuals are incapable of discriminating between habitats, or predation pressure changes in intensity and nature with ontogeny.