In the Neotropics, especially in southeastern Brazil, due to sugarcane and eucalypt monocultures, and the expansion of industries and the largely unplanned urban centers entire aquatic ecosystems are threatened. Nonetheless, benthic macroinvertebrates are important biomonitoring tools to assess the biotic and abiotic condition of endangered freshwater environments. In this study we address how benthic macroinvertebrate diversity respond to the combined effect of local environmental factors. We also aimed to evaluate how benthic macroinvertebrates diversity respond according to the habitat integrity. We expected to find higher diversity in the sampling sites with higher habitat integrity (i.e., low potential of hydrogen, electrical conductivity and water temperature, and high canopy coverage and concentration of dissolved oxygen). By using a multivariate approach (i.e., PCA) and a regression analysis (i.e., Linear Mixed-Effect Model) we were able to address the combined effect of local environmental variables on the benthic macroinvertebrate community. Our results show a negative effect of the environmental factors on the benthic macroinvertebrate diversity. As expected, sites with higher integrity and water quality values according to, respectively, the Habitat Integrity Index (i.e., HII) and the Biological Monitoring Working Party (i.e., BMWP’) tended to have higher benthic macroinvertebrates diversity. This is the first report that provides knowledge of the benthic macroinvertebrate community in the Paulicéia river, within the Cerrado Pé-de-Gigante, a conservation unity of full protection of a State Park in the Neotropics.

The balance between precipitation and evapotranspiration (ET) has direct effect on vegetation, and any change in its structure and composition can influence it. The aim of this study is to determine experimentally the daily evapotranspiration (ET) of the invasive species, Hedychium coronarium, and to compare with a group of four native species of the riparian forest. The experiment was carried out in a greenhouse with three different treatments: (1) only the invasive species; (2) only native species; and (3) a mixture of invasive and native species. In each lysimeter, pressure transducers recorded the water level at every 15 min along 14 months. Daily ET was calculated by the method of Gribovszki et al. (2008) and varied according to the treatment, indicating that different species (invasive or native) use the water differently. The maximum accumulated daily ET occurred for mixture treatment (2540.16 mm), while the treatment with the invasive plant presented the lowest value (2172.53 mm). H. coronarium, in monodominant stands, can reduce evapotranspiration on invaded areas and increase it when immersed in the riparian forest.