Environmental quality of a stream can be better predicted by phylogenetic than by taxonomic diversity

Abstract

-Different indices of taxonomic diversity (TD) and phylogenetic diversity (PD) of the macrobenthos were compared to determine the efficient predictors of environmental quality (EQ) in different types of watercourses in Poland. Archived data of 864 samples of benthic invertebrates identified to the family level were analysed on the basis of linear and non-linear multiply regression. The strengths of the correlations between two measures of EQ:BMWPpl (British Monitoring Working Party score system, Polish modification) and MMI (Multimetric Macroinvertebrate Index) and the values of taxonomic richness and three well-known TD indices: Shannon, Margalef and J' Evenness were compared to those for values of three PD indices, based on taxonomic distinctness. Taxonomic richness and all PD indices correlated more strongly with both measures of EQ than all TD indices. Correlations with both types of diversity indices were visibly stronger for BMWPpl when compared with MMI. We suggest that analysed indices of PD, especially MDis (mean phylogenetic distance between families in a sample), are related with EQ strongly enough to be taken into account as potential metrics in selection procedures of biological assessment. Nous suggérons que les indices analysés de la diversité phylogénétique, en particulier les MDis (distance phylogénétique moyenne entre les familles dans un échantillon), sont liés à une QE suffisamment forte pour être pris en compte comme mesure potentielle dans les procédures de sélection de l'évaluation biologique.Mots-clés : diversité phylogénétique / diversité taxonomique / macrobenthos / qualité environnementale / rivière

Phylogenetic diversity of larval Chironomidae (Diptera) in lowland rivers as a potential tool in assessment of environmental quality

“…MMI is the only official index used in Poland to assess the ecological status of freshwater environments on the basis of macrobenthos. This index used as a measure of environmental quality, however, seems to be a weaker predictor of macrobenthos biodiversity than, for example, the well-known and widely used index BMWP (Koperski & Meronka, 2017). Potential reasons for its relative weakness may be, among others: the use of the Shannon index as one of the core index, which is calculated on the basis of data in which Chironomidae, most frequent, most abundant and most divergent ecologically group of macrobenthos are not determined more precisely and the assumption of linear relationship between values of core indices and ecological status.…”

“…The analysis of the rate of species accumulation obtained as a result of the rarefaction procedure unambiguously shows the same pattern of dependence of the estimated species richness on the value of ecological status as in the case of observed species richness. This type of response, highest diversity in moderate ecological status, may occur in different taxonomic groups, despite the observed monotonic increase in the general richness of macrobenthos families along with the increase in environmental quality (Koperski & Meronka, 2017). Only those indices whose extreme values occur at extremely low or high levels of degradation may be practically applied in biological assessment (Hering et al, 2006).…”

“…Well-known and commonly used indices of phylogenetic diversity were applied to develop index ChiPDi: quadratic entropy (Pavoine et al, 2005;Koperski, 2017) and total phylogenetic distance (e.g., Allen et al, 2009;Koperski & Meronka, 2017). Different types of taxonomic richness of benthic animals (species richness, family richness) have been found as a metrics strongly correlated with the disturbance in streams (e.g., Compin & Cereghino, 2003;Englund et al, 2007).…”

Taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional diversity of leeches (Hirudinea) and their suitability in biological assessment of environmental quality

“…family richness, calculated for benthic invertebrates strongly correlates positively with environmental quality in different watercourses (e.g. Barbour et al, 1996;Koperski and Meronka, 2017) being one of the most important metric used to assess their ecological status (e.g. Armitage et al, 1983;Bis and Mikulec, 2013).…”

“…To calculate values of taxonomic distinctness and phylogenetic diversity two software procedures were created in Visual Basic (Koperski and Meronka, 2017) and applied into the data base in the Excel 2013 software package, Microsoft Office. Values of all indices are presented as the first, second (median) and third quartile, percentile 0.9 and maximal value in each group of sites, independently for each biocoenotic type of watercourses.…”