Resilience of the macroinvertebrate community of a small mountain river (Mau River, Portugal) subject to multiple stresses

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2014

Authors

Tania Vidal (Author) Other; Joana I Santos (Author) Other; Catarina R Marques (Author) Other; Joana L Pereira (Author) Other; Maria Teresa Claro (Author) Other; Ruth Pereira (Author) FCUP; Bruno B Castro (Author) Other; Amadeu Soares (Author) Other; Fernando Goncalves (Author) Other

Journal

Title: Marine and Freshwater Research

Vol. 65

Pages: 633-644

ISSN: 1323-1650

Publisher: CSIRO Publishing

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 11 Citations

Scopus - 12 Citations

Scientific classification

FOS: Agrarian Sciences > Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-009-M3Y

DOI: 10.1071/mf13207

Abstract (EN): Freshwaters commonly face human pressure, which produces multiple stressor scenarios that may threaten their ecological status. Biotic community assessments are useful tools to monitor such changes, and the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) has brought this into the legislative framework. The present study focused on a small mountain river facing multiple stresses, with the purpose of (1) evaluating the sensitivity of the macroinvertebrate community to the stresses, (2) assessing whether the ecological status was impaired in different years and (3) comparing the WFD approach with more refined community analyses. The river was generally in a very good ecological state. Despite seasonal and inter-annual fluctuations, no evident stressor-related effects were detected. We hypothesise that the observed resilience was the result of (1) the current dormant state of the abandoned mining areas (the most relevant potential source of contamination) and (2) the naturalness and strong current of the river, which buffered the impacts of contamination. Such a pattern may be generally valid for small mountain rivers, making them therefore more resilient to stresses. Nevertheless, small changes in community structure in the lowest reach of the river - undetected by the WFD assessment scheme - suggest that some disturbance was present, signalling the need for intervention by managers.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 12