A Field Guide for Monitoring Riverine Macroplastic Entrapment in Water Hyacinths

River plastic pollution is an environmental challenge of growing concern. However, there are still many unknowns related to the principal drivers of river plastic transport. Floating aquatic vegetation, such as water hyacinths, have been found to aggregate and carry large amounts of plastic debris in tropical river systems. Monitoring the entrapment of plastics in hyacinths is therefore crucial to answer the relevant scientific and societal questions. Long-term monitoring efforts are yet to be designed and implemented at large scale and various field measuring techniques can be applied. Here, we present a field guide on available methods that can be upscaled in space and time, to characterize macroplastic entrapment within floating vegetation. Five measurement techniques commonly used in plastic and vegetation monitoring were applied to the Saigon river, Vietnam. These included physical sampling, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle imagery, bridge imagery, visual counting, and satellite imagery. We compare these techniques based on their suitability to derive metrics of interest, their relevancy at different spatiotemporal scales and their benefits and drawbacks. This field guide can be used by practitioners and researchers to design future monitoring campaigns and to assess the suitability of each method to investigate specific aspects of macroplastic and floating vegetation interactions.

COMPLEX ASSOCIATIONS OF ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS MAY EXPLAIN BLANCHARD'S CRICKET FROG, ACRIS BLANCHARDI, DECLINES AND DRIVE POPULATION RECOVERY

Blanchard’s Cricket Frog, Acris blanchardi, is a small hylid frog that was once among the most common amphibians in any part of its range. Today, it remains abundant in much of the southern portion of its range, but is now disappearing elsewhere. Our analysis of habitat characters observed across several states revealed interesting relationships of these factors with the abundance or presence of Blanchard’s Cricket Frog. Further, we later established two ½ acre ponds based on these relationships that led to immediate colonization of the ponds by cricket frogs followed by explosive production of juveniles less than a year later. Our findings suggest that habitat management for this species should specifically manage the shoreline grade and especially the aquatic floating vegetation to maximize population growth and sustenance.

An interesting new record of the almost unknown brachypterous phaneropterine katydid Xenicola dohrni (Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae) from Argentina, and its high-ultrasound male-female communication

The southernmost record of the neotropical genus Xenicola is documented. An apparently tiny population of X. dohrni, a species described long ago from southern Brazil without other published records, lives at the shore of the Río de la Plata, 1000 km further south. Perhaps it has been established there by means of floating vegetation. The acoustic communication of this species is also very interesting: The male produces with its minuscule tegmina brief signals with a carrier frequency range between 80 and 100 kHz. The female responds, and the male modifies its song when engaged in a duet. It modifies it further, when the female responds from very close. The paper includes a review of the records of Xenicola species on biodiversity observation platforms.

Transverse Distribution of the Streamwise Velocity for the Open-channel Flow With Floating Vegetated Islands

Floating vegetation islands (FVIs) have been widely utilized in various river ecological restoration projects due to their ability to purify pollutants. FVIs float at the surface of shallow pools with their roots unanchored in the sediment. Biofilm formed by roots under islands filters nutrients and particles in the water flowing through it. Flow field disturbance will occur and transverse distribution of flow velocity will change due to the existence of FVIs. Transport efficiency of suspended solids, nutrients, and pollutants will also be altered. A modified analytical model that considers effects of boundary friction, drag force of vegetation, transverse shear turbulence, and secondary flow is established to predict transverse variation of depth-averaged streamwise velocity for the open-channel flow with FVIs using Shiono and Knight method. The simulation results with suitable boundary conditions successfully predicted lateral profile of the depth-averaged streamwise velocity compared with the experimental results of symmetrical and unsymmetrical arrangements of FVIs. Hence, the presented model can provide guidance for investigating flow characteristics of rivers with FVIs.

Gastrotrichs and tardigrades in a remnant of Atlantic Forest (Serra do Japi, SP, Brazil)

Serra do Japi, located in the southeast of São Paulo State, is considered a priority area for conservation, as it houses original Atlantic Forest cover remains. Despite the significant number of studies about vertebrates and invertebrates that were carried out in this region, the meiofauna biodiversity is completely unknown. Thus, the present study aimed to investigate for the first time freshwater Gastrotricha and limnoterrestrial Tardigrada in Serra do Japi Biological Reserve. Samples of sediments, periphyton and floating vegetation in reservoirs and natural lagoons, and mosses growing on native and non-native tree trunks were collected in May 2019. At least five gastrotrichs morphotypes were identified and three of them were formally described: Chaetonotus acanthocephalus, C. dadayi (first record in Brazil), and Heterolepidoderma mariae (first record outside the type locality). In regards to tardigrades, twelve morphotypes were identified and four of them were formally described: Pseudechiniscus juanitae, Minibiotus cf. acontistus, Echiniscus dreyfusi and Itaquascon umbellinae (last two species reported for the first time outside the type locality). This study reinforces that meiofaunal diversity and distribution have been underestimated, even in one of the five largest hotspots in the world.

Oxygen Transfer Capacity as a Measure of Water Aeration by Floating Reed Plants: Initial Laboratory Studies

Reed-Phragmites australis (Cav.) Trin. ex Steud, an aquatic plant, commonly used in constructed wetlands for wastewater treatment, supplies oxygen into the subsurface environment. Reed may be used as a ‘green machine’ in the form of a floating vegetation cover with many applications: wastewater lagoons, manure lagoons or sewage sludge lagoons. An important measure of the performance of the plant system is the oxygen transfer capacity (OTC). Accurate prediction of the OTC in relation to reed biomass would be crucial in modelling its influence on organic matter degradation and ammonia–nitrogen oxygenation in such lagoons. Laboratory experiments aiming to determine OTC and its dependence on reed biomass were carried out. Eight plants with a total dry mass ranging from approximately 3 to 7 g were tested. Mean OTC was determined per plant: 0.18 ± 0.21 (g O2·m−3·h−1·plant−1), with respect to leaves-and-stem dry mass (dlsm): 44.91 ± 35.21 (g O2·m−3·h−1·g dlsm−1), and to total dry mass (dtm): 33.25 ± 27.97 (g O2·m−3·h−1·g dtm−1). In relation to the relatively small root dry mass (drm), the OTC value was 136.02 ± 147.19 (g O2·m−3·h−1·g drm−1). Measured OTC values varied widely between the individual plants (variation coefficient 115%), in accordance with their differing size. Oxygenation performance was greatest in the reed plants with larger above ground dry mass (>4 g dlsm), but no influence of the root dry mass on the OTC rate was found.

Potential of aquatic weeds to improve water quality in natural waterways of the Zambezi catchment

One prominent effect of nutrient pollution of surface waters is the mass invasion of floating plants, which can clog waterways, disrupting human use of aquatic systems. These plants are widely vilified and motivate expensive control campaigns, but their presence may be providing a poorly recognized function in the cycling of excess nutrients. The capacity for floating plants to absorb nutrients from surface water has been understood for decades, primarily from their use in constructed wetlands for wastewater treatment. Yet, in natural settings, there has not been to date any effort to quantify whether floating plant invasions represent important pools or fluxes of nutrients relative to those of the river catchments in which they occur. We found that seasonal hydrologic cycles in the Zambezi trap and flush floating plants from river choke points, such as dams and river confluences, on an annual basis. Peak plant biomass at such choke points constitutes a proxy for estimating annual plant-bound nutrient loads. We assessed the significance of floating vegetation as nutrient sinks by comparing annual plant-bound nutrient loading to conventional river nutrient loading (dissolved and particulate) for four tributaries of the Zambezi River in Zambia. We found that the relative importance of floating vegetation was greatest in the more urbanized catchments, such as the Maramba River draining the city of Livingstone, representing approximately 30% and 9% of annual digestible phosphorus and nitrogen flux respectively. We also found plant-bound phosphorus to be important in the Kafue River (19%), draining the industrial town of Kafue and extensive sugarcane plantations. These results demonstrate the great potential of floating plants to take up excess nutrients from natural river systems. Given the importance of hydrology in the life cycle of floating vegetation, controlled dam discharges may have an important role in managing them and their water quality treatment functions.

Living with floating vegetation invasions

Invasions of water bodies by floating vegetation, including water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes), are a huge global problem for fisheries, hydropower generation, and transportation. We analyzed floating plant coverage on 20 reservoirs across the world’s tropics and subtropics, using > 30 year time-series of LANDSAT remote-sensing imagery. Despite decades of costly weed control, floating invasion severity is increasing. Floating plant coverage correlates with expanding urban land cover in catchments, implicating urban nutrient sources as plausible drivers. Floating vegetation invasions have undeniable societal costs, but also provide benefits. Water hyacinths efficiently absorb nutrients from eutrophic waters, mitigating nutrient pollution problems. When washed up on shores, plants may become compost, increasing soil fertility. The biomass is increasingly used as a renewable biofuel. We propose a more nuanced perspective on these invasions moving away from futile eradication attempts towards an ecosystem management strategy that minimizes negative impacts while integrating potential social and environmental benefits.