scholarly journals Benthic invertebrate production—facilitating answers to ecological riddles in freshwater ecosystems

2010 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 264-285 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur C. Benke ◽  
Alexander D. Huryn
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Finn A. Viehberg ◽  
Andrew S. Medeiros ◽  
Birgit Plessen ◽  
Xiaowa Wang ◽  
Derek Muir ◽  
...  

AbstractHigh latitude freshwater ecosystems are sentinels of human activity and environmental change. The lakes and ponds that characterize Arctic landscapes have a low resilience to buffer variability in climate, especially with increasing global anthropogenic stressors in recent decades. Here, we show that a small freshwater pond in proximity of the archaeological site “Native Point” on Southampton Island (Nunavut, Arctic Canada) is a highly sensitive environmental recorder. The sediment analyses allowed for pinpointing the first arrival of Sadlermiut culture at Native Point to ~ 1250 CE, followed by a dietary shift likely in response to the onset of cooling in the region ~ 1400 CE. The influence of the Sadlermiut on the environment persisted long after the last of their population perished in 1903. Presently, the pond remains a distorted ecosystem that has experienced fundamental shifts in the benthic invertebrate assemblages and accumulated anthropogenic metals in the sediment. Our multi-proxy paleolimnological investigation using geochemical and biological indicators emphasizes that direct and indirect anthropogenic impacts have long-term environmental implications on high latitude ecosystems.


2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Phillip J. Haubrock ◽  
Francesca Pilotto ◽  
Peter Haase

Abstract Background Benthic invertebrate communities are an integral and longstanding component of stream biomonitoring. However, multiple stressors driven by global change threaten benthic invertebrate communities. In particular, climate warming is expected to disrupt freshwater ecosystems. While an increasing number of studies have shown changes in benthic invertebrate community composition in response to climate warming, the effect on stream assessments has rarely been investigated. As several community composition metrics are also used in stream assessments, we predicted that climate warming would worsen stream assessment results. Therefore, we used a comprehensive data set of 2865 benthic invertebrate samples taken between 2000 and 2014 from small central European low mountain streams. We examined the effects of changes in temperature on common community and stream assessment metrics. We used 31 metrics covering composition, richness, tolerance and function of communities, of which many are used in various stream assessment schemes. Results Against our expectations, we identified a decreasing air temperature trend of − 0.18 °C over 15 years. This trend was accompanied by significant changes in community composition, for example, increases in species richness and decreases in the community temperature index (CTI). Further, we identified slight concomitant improvements of various globally used stream quality assessment metrics, such as a decreasing saprobic index and an increasing BMWP. Conclusions While temperature increased by + 0.9 °C during the past 30 years (1985–2014), our 15-year study period (2000–2014) showed a decrease by − 0.18 °C. Therefore, we regard the concomitant improvement in several assessment metrics as a recovery from prior increasing temperatures. In turn, we assume that increases in water temperature will lead to opposite effects and therefore cause declining assessment results. Water managers should be aware of this linkage that in turn could provide a chance to mitigate the effects of global warming by, for example, planting trees along the rivers and the removal of artificial barriers to increase current velocity to minimize a warming effect.


2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (10) ◽  
pp. 170400 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan L. W. Ruppert ◽  
Cassandra Docherty ◽  
Kenton Neufeld ◽  
Kyle Hamilton ◽  
Laura MacPherson ◽  
...  

Prussian carp ( Carassius gibelio ) are one of the most noxious non-native species in Eurasia. Recently, Prussian carp, a non-native freshwater fish species, were genetically confirmed in Alberta, Canada and have been rapidly expanding their range in North America since establishment. Given their rapid range expansion, there is an increasing need to determine how Prussian carp may impact native species. We assessed the severity of the Prussian carp invasion by (i) determining their impact on fish communities, (ii) assessing their impact on benthic invertebrate communities, (iii) evaluating if Prussian carp alter abiotic conditions, and (iv) identifying where we find higher abundances of Prussian carp. When Prussian carp were established, we found significant changes to the fish community. Correspondingly, the degree of impact to benthic invertebrate communities was related to the stage of invasion (none, early or recent), where changes in fish communities were significantly concordant with changes in benthic invertebrate communities. Finally, we found that higher abundances of Prussian carp were significantly associated with lower abundances of a majority of native fish species. Altogether, using three lines of evidence, we determine that Prussian carp can have wide-ranging impacts on freshwater ecosystems in North America, pressing the need for management intervention.


BioScience ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan P. Covich ◽  
Margaret A. Palmer ◽  
Todd A. Crowl

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mauricio J. Carter ◽  
Matías Flores ◽  
Rodrigo Ramos-Jiliberto

AbstractMany freshwater ecosystems worldwide, and particularly Mediterranean ones, show increasing levels of salinity. This changes in water conditions could affect abundance and distribution of inhabiting species as well as the provision of ecosystem services. In this study we conduct laboratory experiments using the macroinvertebrate Smicridea annulicornis as a model organism. Our factorial experiments were designed to evaluate the effects of geographical origin on organisms and salinity levels on survival and behavioral responses of caddisflies. The experimental organisms were captured from rivers belonging to three hydrological basins along a 450 Km latitudinal gradient in the Mediterranean region of Chile. Animals were exposed to three conductivity levels, from 180 to 1400 μS/cm, close to the historical averages of the source rivers. We measured the behavioral responses to experimental stimulii and the survival time. Our results showed that geography origin shaped the behavioral and survival responses to salinity. In particular, survival and activity decreased more strongly with increasing salinity in organisms coming from more dilute waters. This suggests local adaptation to be determinant for salinity responses in this species of benthic invertebrate. In the current scenario of fast temporal and spatial changes in water levels and salt concentration, the conservation of geographic intra-specific variation of aquatic species is crucial for lowering the risk of salinity-driven biodiversity loss.


2013 ◽  
Vol 25 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 136-148
Author(s):  
I. V. Gryb

The concept of an explosion in freshwater ecosystems as a result of the release of accumulated energy, accompanied by the destruction of the steady climax successions of hydrocenoses is presented. The typification of local explosions as well as methods for assessing their risk during the development of river basins are shown. The change in atmospheric circulation, impaired phases of the hydrological regime of rivers, increasing the average temperature of the planet, including in Polesie to 0,6 ºC, deforestation leads to concentration and release of huge amounts of unmanaged terrestrial energy, which manifests itself in the form of disasters and emergencies. Hydroecological explosion is formed as a result of multifactorial external influence (natural and anthropogenic) on the water body in a certain period of time. Moreover, its level at wastewater discharge depends on the mass of recycled impurities and behaved processing capacity of the reservoir, and the mass of dumped on biocides and the possibility of the water flow to their dilution and to the utilization of non-toxic concentrations. In all these cases the preservation of "centers of life" in the tributaries of the first order – local fish reproduction areas contributed to ecosystem recovery, and the entire ecosystem has evolved from equilibrium to non-equilibrium with further restructuring after the explosion and environmental transition to a new trophic level. It means that hydroecological explosion can be researched as the logical course of development of living matter in abiotic environmental conditions, ending abruptly with the formation of new species composition cenoses and new bio-productivity. The buffer capacity of the water environment is reduced due to re-development and anthropic transformation of geobiocenoses of river basins, which leads to a weakening of life resistance. This applies particularly to the southern industrial regions of Ukraine, located in the arid zone that is even more relevant in the context of increased average temperature due to the greenhouse effect, as well as to Polesie (Western, Central and Chernihiv), had been exposed to large-scale drainage of 60-80th years, which contributed to the degradation of peatlands and fitostroma. Imposing the western trace of emissions from the Chernobyl accident to these areas had created the conditions of prolonged hydroecological explosion in an intense process of aging water bodies, especially lakes, change in species composition of fish fauna and the occurrence of neoplasms at the organismal level. Under these conditions, for the existence of man and the environment the vitaukta should be strengthened, i.e. buffer resistance and capacitance the aquatic environment, bioefficiency on the one hand and balanced using the energy deposited - on the other. This will restore the functioning of ecosystems "channel-floodplain", "riverbed-lake", reducing the energy load on the aquatic environment. Hydroecological explosions of natural origin can not be considered a pathology – it is a jump process of natural selection of species of biota. Another thing, if they are of anthropogenic origin and if the magnitude of such an impact is on the power of geological factors. Hydroecological explosions can be regarded as a manifestation of environmental wars that consciously or unconsciously, human society is waging against themselves and their kind in the river basins, so prevention of entropy increase in the aquatic environment and the prevention of hydroecological explosions is a matter of human survival. While the man - is not the final link in the development of living matter, it can develop without him, as matter is eternal, and the forms of its existence are different.


2002 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
V. V. Murina ◽  
Ye. V. Lisitskaya ◽  
V. K. Shalyapin

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