How Agriculture, Connectivity and Water Management Can Affect Water Quality of a Mediterranean Coastal Wetland

Abstract

The Natural Park of Albufera (Valencia, Spain) is an important Mediterranean coastal wetland that suffers continuous environmental effects from human activities and water uses, mainly related to agriculture and urban/industrial sewage discharges. The aim of this research was to assess the water quality of the different aquatic environments of this wetland, taking into account the connection between them, the agricultural impact and the management of irrigation water. The UE Water Framework Directive was followed in order to evaluate the ecological and trophic status of water systems. Spatial approaches were used to integrate physicochemical data into GIS vector layers to map the more problematic points of pollution. The results showed a globally eutrophic system with poor ecological potential. The wetland is nutrient-overloaded during the entire rice cultivation period. Good-quality water inputs are deficient, since the river network already has high levels of nutrients and pollutants, especially in the northern area, where river water is mixed with inappropriate effluents from wastewater treatment plants. Agriculture and water management affected the area intensively up to the Albufera lake, modulating most of the studied variables. The information gathered here can help to optimize the global study and management of the coastal Mediterranean wetlands, which are highly linked to agriculture.

Application of an Ecotoxicological Battery Test to the Paddy Field Soils of the Albufera Natural Park

“…The zone includes part of the main rivers, irrigation channels and inflows and outflows, and is surrounded mostly by paddy fields, but also by some industries and companies. For this reason, the area is continuously affected by the environmental effects of human activities and water uses, related mainly to agriculture and urban/industrial sewage discharges [ 26 ]. This complex irrigation system connects many canals to the sewerage infrastructures of the surrounding municipalities, and receives industrial and urban discharges.…”

Assessing Contamination in Transitional Waters Using Geospatial Technologies: A Review

“…These tools have facilitated the identification of environmental risks, connectivity patterns, and spatial variations in pollutant concentrations. A similar approach with geolocation and punctual distributions was adopted by Ve et al [67], who integrated physicochemical data into GIS vector layers to map the mo problematic pollution hotspots, considering the agricultural types associated with ea sampling point (Figure 6). Subsequently, the point spatial distribution maps for water i dices were developed to evaluate environmental pollution and environmental ri through the Trophic State Index and ecological potential.…”

How the diversity of constructed wetlands improves the plankton communities discharged into a protected Mediterranean wetland

“…The transition from a highly anthropically disturbed lotic environment (water inlet channels) to a more lentic wetland environment (within the CWs) with no anthropic alterations, and most likely with vegetation, will favour the change from a plankton community, which is a miscellany originated in the agricultural fields, sewage treatment plants and irrigation channels (Vera-Herrera et al, 2022), towards a community where selective predation, competition and rapid growth allow the development of certain species and dominant roles (Calero et al, 2015;Travaini-Lima et al, 2016;Rodrigo et al, 2018). We already know that the composition of the planktonic communities in the inlets and outlets in these CWs is different (Rodrigo & Segura, 2020), but this composition could also be different between the different sites inside each CW, as occurs in natural wetlands (Rojo et al, 2012).…”