Effects of human shoreline development on littoral macroinvertebrates in lowland lakes

Abstract

Summary1. The shores of many lakes have been substantially altered by human developments such as erosion control structures or recreational beaches. Such alterations are likely to increase in the future, yet almost nothing is known about their impacts on the littoral macroinvertebrate community. 2. Macroinvertebrates were studied in seven German lowland lakes exhibiting natural shorelines (reference), retaining walls, ripraps and recreational beaches to examine impacts on the eulittoral (0-0·2 m water depth) and infralittoral (0·2-1·2 m water depth) communities associated with the three types of shoreline development. 3. Among sites, eulittoral species richness and abundance of Coleoptera, Gastropoda, Trichoptera, shredders and xylophagous species were lowest on beaches and retaining walls but ripraps did not differ significantly from natural shorelines. Retaining walls and ripraps had no significant impact on the infralittoral macroinvertebrate community. Conversely, beaches had significantly lower infralittoral species richness and abundance of Ephemeroptera, Trichoptera and shredders than natural shorelines. Furthermore, species richness was correlated positively with habitat heterogeneity expressed as number of habitat types. 4. Among lakes, whole-lake littoral macroinvertebrate density increased with increasing proportion of developed shorelines due to increasing abundances of Chironomidae. The remaining macroinvertebrate major groups decreased with increasing proportion of shoreline development. 5. Synthesis and applications . The biological impacts of shoreline development in lowland lakes depend upon the extent to which structural complexity and heterogeneity of littoral habitats are reduced. Hence, we recommend that management programmes focus upon the conservation of littoral habitat complexity and habitat heterogeneity. The biological effects of shoreline development may be assessed efficiently by combining an assessment of the morphological status of lakeshores and information on macroinvertebrate indicator species with a defined response to the loss of their preferred habitats.

Ecology of freshwater shore zones

“…There are no complete inventories of the biotas of freshwater shore zones, but such rich zones are likely to support hundreds to thousands of species, excluding bacteria. Shore zone habitats are highly varied, and different kinds of shore zone support different kinds of plants and animals (e.g., Bänziger 1995;Madjeczak et al 1998;Lewin et al 2004;Brauns et al 2007). Consequently, it is difficult to make any generalizations about the ''typical'' shore zone biota.…”

Settlement preferences of leeches (Clitellata: Hirudinida) for different artificial substrates

“…The introduction of solid waste can replace natural habitats and cause fragmentation (e.g. changing the nature of the substrate, creating barriers), resulting in the disappearance of certain taxa and a decline in local biodiversity (Beaven et al, 2000;Brauns et al, 2007). However, most often they create new habitats and increase the space available for many plants and invertebrates (Winston, 1982;Chapman & Clynick, 2006;Jatulewicz, 2007;Czarnecka et al, 2009).…”

Integrating applied lake ecology into spatial planning: towards a socially acceptable lakeshore restoration at Lake Velence (Hungary)

“…As a result of altered, urbanised lakeshores, the number of fish-species (Bryan -Scarnecchia, 1992) and amphibian individuals are decreasing (Woodford -Meyer, 2003). Shoreline morphology exerts a significantly stronger influence on littoral macroinvertebrates compared to lake trophic state (Brauns et al, 2007;Miler et al, 2013).…”

“…The shoreline stabilization of different types (mainly reinforced concrete structures, and/or using rip rap stones) are typically colonised with new vegetation-and animalspecies, their diversity fall often short of that on natural shores (Entz -Sebestyén, 1942;Gabriel -Bodensteiner, 2012;Jennings et al 1999). In some cases the artificial shoreline stabilization works when assessed separately, may as well provide advantageous habitat conditions for some animal species, in other cases, however, when evaluating shore regulation at lake-wide scales, the reduced biodiversity of habitats tends towards a disadvantageous process for the total ecosystem (Brauns et al, 2007;Lange, 1999).…”