Adult odonate abundance and community assemblage measures as indicators of stream ecological integrity: A case study

Abstract

Water resources demand constant conservation actions due to several problems (e.g. riparian vegetation cut-off, construction of dams, acidification, sewage and pesticide spills) that degrade the aquatic systems worldwide and affect its physicochemical parameters and habitat characteristics. Odonata is a potential group of organisms that could indicate these habitat alterations once they have aquatic and terrestrial life forms. In this study, we tested the use of adult odonate individual species and community assemblage measures to evaluate the effect of riparian vegetation cut-off and sewage discharges. The study was performed at Turvo Sujo River, in Viçosa, Southern Brazil. We selected twelve sites, six of them were upstream and six were downstream the city. Species abundance and species richness estimates of adult odonates were performed on sunny days during summer and winter. We analyzed the goodness-of-fit of the species abundances to geometric and lognormal series. We also measured the Habitat Physical Integrity Score (HPIS), pasture and forest proportions and physicochemical water parameters at each site. Only few species were abundant in up- and downstream regions. Abundance of Argia modesta was higher at the upstream (t = 3.188; df = 17; p = 0.005) than at the downstream region and this species is a potential habitat bioindicator organisms. Species richness was statistically different only in the wet season and species–abundance relations at the two regions fitted well to both geometric and lognormal series. The lack of riparian vegetation indicates a loss of habitat integrity and heterogeneity at Turvo Sujo River basin, which was mainly dominated by lake-dwelling odonate species. Low species richness differences are caused by species pool biases toward those ones capable to survive at degraded ecosystems, suggesting that the effects of water parameters are much less important than a landscape dominated by pastures and practically without forests. We suggest the use of species–abundance models (like geometric and lognormal series) to determine the degree of impacts over a given community once they are simple models and can show intrinsic processes structuring communities.