A structural equation model to predict macroinvertebrate-based ecological status in catchments influenced by anthropogenic pressures

Fernandes, António Carlos Pinheiro; Fernandes, Luís Filipe Sanches; Moura, João Paulo; Cortes, Rui; Pacheco, Fernando António Leal

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.05.117

Cited by 41 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 86 publications

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“…But, if the data of point and diffuse sources from APA were monthly, or even seasonal, it is believed that the significance of "Contaminant Emissions" would be higher in the model and could possibly reveal higher effects than landscape metrics. In previous studies where the Ave River Basin water quality was assessed, it was noted that point-source pressures [51] and livestock production [52] were major threats to water quality. But, in those studies, landscape metrics were not used in such a detailed form, only the percentage of catchments occupied by agricultural and artificial areas were used.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Role of Landscape Configuration, Season, and Distance from Contaminant Sources on the Degradation of Stream Water Quality in Urban Catchments

Fernandes

Cortes

et al. 2019

Water

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Water resources are threatened by many pollution sources. The harmful effects of pollution can be evaluated through biological indicators capable of tracing problems in life forms caused by the contaminants discharged into the streams. In the present study, the effects on stream water quality of landscape configuration, season, and distance from contaminant emissions of diffuse and point sources were accessed through the evaluation of a Portuguese macroinvertebrate index (IPtIN) in 12 observation points distributed within the studied area (Ave River Basin, Portugal). Partial least-squares path models (PLS-PMs) were used to set up cause–effect relationships between this index, various metrics adapted to forest, agriculture, and artificial areas, and the aforementioned emissions, considering 13 distances from the contaminant sources ranging from 100 m to 56 km. The PLS-PM models were applied to summer and winter data to explore seasonality effects. The results of PLS-PM exposed significant scale and seasonal effects. The harmful effects of artificial areas were visible for distances larger than 10 km. The impact of agriculture was also distance related, but in summer this influence was more evident. The forested areas could hold onto contamination mainly in the winter periods. The impact of diffuse contaminant emissions was stronger during summer, when accessed on a short distance. The impact of effluent discharges was small, compared to the influence of landscape metrics, and had a limited statistical significance. Overall, the PLS-PM results evidenced significant cause–effect relationships between land use metrics and stream water quality at 10 km or larger scales, regardless of the season. This result is valid for the studied catchment, but transposition to other similar catchments needs to be carefully verified given the limited, though available, number of observation points.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Role of Landscape Configuration, Season, and Distance from Contaminant Sources on the Degradation of Stream Water Quality in Urban Catchments

Fernandes

Cortes

et al. 2019

Water

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“…In concordance, other authors refer to the same pollution causes (Dunck et al, 2015;Peixoto et al, 2013), but also livestock production effects became concerning (Ribeiro et al, 2016), which led authors to give more attention to the impacts of diffuse pollution sources (Fonseca et al, 2018;Terêncio et al, 2017). In studies where the effects of diffuse and point source pressures are accessed, the results show both have a massive effect (Fernandes et al, 2019(Fernandes et al, , 2018. Still, in those studies, the impact of the land-use configuration was not accessed.…”

Section: Study Areamentioning

confidence: 82%

“…S.1). Still, it cannot be forgotten that another factor that influences the results is the released contaminants from point source pressures (Fernandes et al, 2019), which change over the years. As other authors have mentioned (Alves et al, 2009;Gonçalves et al, 1992;Soares et al, 1999), in ARB the period with the highest impact of point source pressures could be during the second half of the 20th century, which can possibly justify that in the first analysed HYs conductivity, ammoniacal nitrogen, total orthophosphate, and biological oxygen demand had the highest values.…”

Section: Water Quality Vs Landscapementioning

confidence: 99%

The consequences for stream water quality of long-term changes in landscape patterns: Implications for land use management and policies

et al. 2021

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“…Such results prove that sustainable agriculture can not harm, but even, improve water quality when combined with forested land uses, as barriers of contamination from runoff or soil erosion. In studies of similar scope, it was used PLS-PM (Partial Leas Squares Path -Modelling) to establish cause-effect interactions between pressures with ecological status [50][51][52], in Ave River Basin. The authors concluded that livestock and effluent discharges were major threats to water quality, but in such analysis, the only studied landscape metric was only the area percentage for different land-use types "pz".…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Such approaches that resort to multivariate statistical methods are quite useful to interpret which variables have a stronger effect. However, the disadvantage is that such statistical methods are vulnerable to collinearity and for this reason, the number of variables used in the models has to be reduced due to the variance inflation factor [53], and even significant variables must be discarded from such models [51].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the Effects of Landscape Metrics in Water Quality, Ave River Basin Case Study

Fernandes¹,

Martins²,

Fernandes³

et al. 2020

IJDNE

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Ave River Basin, located in the northern region of Portugal, was once tagged as one of the most polluted of Europe. Although many authors have given prominence to point source pressures, the present study reveals challenging results, by exposing strong effects of landscape metrics in water quality. In twelve sampling sites, the Portuguese benthic macroinvertebrate index (IPtIN) was measured during the winter and summer of 2017. For each site, it was delineated drainage sections, ranging from 100 meters to the entire drainage area. For each section, it was calculated landscape metrics for generic land-use types, and it was also calculated the Spearman's rank correlation coefficient, between each metric in each scale with IPtIN. The preliminary analysis of results led to understand during the winter edge length and number of patches of artificial surfaces revealed a negative impact. Variables such as connectance of agricultural land use patches only revealed a negative influence during summer, in a short-range spatial extent. The contrast between agricultural land uses with forested and with artificial areas was the metric with a notable effect, since maximum correlations were achieved for the contrast between forested and agriculture, and minimum in the contrast between agriculture with artificial areas.

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A structural equation model to predict macroinvertebrate-based ecological status in catchments influenced by anthropogenic pressures

Cited by 41 publications

References 86 publications

The Role of Landscape Configuration, Season, and Distance from Contaminant Sources on the Degradation of Stream Water Quality in Urban Catchments

The Role of Landscape Configuration, Season, and Distance from Contaminant Sources on the Degradation of Stream Water Quality in Urban Catchments

The consequences for stream water quality of long-term changes in landscape patterns: Implications for land use management and policies

Exploring the Effects of Landscape Metrics in Water Quality, Ave River Basin Case Study

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