Biological indices applied to benthic macroinvertebrates at reference conditions of mountain streams in two ecoregions (Poland, the Slovak Republic)

Abstract

The study was carried out from 2007 to 2010 in two ecoregions: the Carpathians and the Central Highlands. The objectives of our survey were to test the existing biological index metric based on benthic macroinvertebrates at reference conditions in the high-and mid-altitude mountain streams of two ecoregions according to the requirements of the EU WFD and to determine which environmental factors influence the distribution of benthic macroinvertebrates. Our results revealed statistically significant differences in the values of the physical and chemical parameters of water as well as the mean values of metrics between the types of streams at the sampling sites. RDA analysis showed that the temperature of the water, pH, conductivity, the stream gradient, values of the HQA index, and altitude were the parameters most associated with the distribution of benthic macroinvertebrate taxa and the values of the metrics. The values of biological indices should be considered according to the stream typology including altitude and geology. At the reference conditions, the suggested border values of biological indices are very harsh. The values of the biological indices of most sampling sites did not correspond to the requirements of the high status in rivers. The streams at altitudes above 1,200 m a.s.l. should be treated as another river type and new reference values should be established.

Assessing the influence of source distance and hydroecoregion on the invertebrate assemblage similarity in central Italy streams

“…The greatest separation between HER for the three wiSD groups underlined the importance of using both levels of site classifications in evaluating physico-chemical differences between sites. Indices and metrics are generally used as a proxy of water quality and of structure of macroinvertebrate assemblages (AQEM consortium, 2002;Lewin et al, 2013;Manfrin et al, 2013). The LUI output confirms that HER15 sites showed the highest anthropic impact, the opposite for HER13, confirming the PCA scatter plot.…”

Macrophyte and macroinvertebrate patterns in unimpacted mountain rivers of two European ecoregions

“…To conclude, the same environmental variables reflecting geology, geography or hydrology were the most important (statistically significant) and structuring the mountain stream communities both in the reference and human-impacted sites in these Ecoregions. The importance of geology, geography and hydrology was not displaced by the other factors such as water pollution when affected by human activities (Lewin et al, 2013(Lewin et al, , 2014. However, our previous studies showed that severe physical habitat modifications (e.g.…”

“…These rivers are located at the highest altitudes, and their river channels are characterised by the greatest slopes, and related to that, the most dynamic flow and the coarsest-grained riverbed material. Water flowing in such rivers is most depleted in terms of its ion composition, and its pH is close to neutral (Lewin et al, 2013). Considerable specificity was also found for Carpathian calcareous rivers, which in terms of the water's physical and chemical parameters showed a strong dependence on substrate geology, being characterised by high total hardness, alkalinity, conductivity and pH.…”

“…Our previous studies referred to the environmental factors and biological indices applied to benthic macroinvertebrates and macrophytes both at reference and human-impacted streams in two Ecoregions 9 and 10 ( Lewin et al, 2014). The results of our previous survey showed that temperature of the water, pH, conductivity, stream gradient, altitude and values of the Habitat Quality Assessment index (HQA) were the parameters most associated (statistically significant) with the distribution of benthic macroinvertebrate taxa and values of the metrics in reference mountain streams of Ecoregions 9 and 10 ( Lewin et al, 2013Lewin et al, , 2015. Taking into consideration at the same time both the reference and human-impacted streams of the same Ecoregions, only four environmental variables were important, i.e.…”

Macroinvertebrate-based biotic indices for evaluating thewater quality of Kargı Stream (Antalya, Turkey)

“…Six versions of BMWP and three versions of ASPT were applied to determine the water quality of this stream. There have been many different successful adaptations of the BMWP and ASPT indices to countries other than the UK (AlbaTercedor and Sanchez-Ortega, 1988;Jacobsen, 1998;Ferreira et al, 2004;Czerniawska-Kusza, 2005;Roche et al, 2010;Kazancı et al, 2013;Lewin et al, 2013). It was found that the most appropriate indices for the physical and chemical indices are BMWP (original version) and ASPT (original and Czech versions) among all indices used in the current study.…”