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Freshwater Communities in Human-Altered Ecosystems
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Freshwater Communities in Human-Altered Ecosystems

A special issue of Water (ISSN 2073-4441). This special issue belongs to the section "Biodiversity and Functionality of Aquatic Ecosystems".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (10 December 2021) | Viewed by 12674

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Martin Bláha

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
University of South Bohemia, Faculty of Fishery and Protection of Waters, Research Institute of Fish Culture and Hydrobiology, Zátiší 728/II, 38925 Vodňany, Czech Republic
Interests: effect of anthropogenic activities on aquatic macroinvertebrates
Dr. Kateřina Grabicová

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Faculty of Fishery and Protection of Waters, Research Institute of Fish Culture and Hydrobiology, University of South Bohemia, Zátiší 728/II, 38925 Vodňany, Czech Republic
Interests: environmental chemistry; ecology

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Rapid human-induced environmental changes, such as warming, nutrient enrichment, habitat fragmentation, and pollution, pose threats to global biodiversity and the functioning of aquatic ecosystems. Macroinvertebrate communities are an important part of aquatic ecosystems, playing essential roles in energy flow and nutrient cycling, and the species richness and functional importance of the community generally go unnoticed until unexpected changes occur in ecosystems. Therefore, aquatic macroinvertebrates are frequently used for biomonitoring, being able to either respond quickly to deteriorated conditions and/or to bioaccumulate xenobiotics entering water recipients. Although changes could not mean the disappearance of particular species, their behaviour, physiology or life cycle could be altered, affecting the ecosystem’s functioning. However, our knowledge about the ecological effects of the mentioned human-induced changes to aquatic ecosystem is very limited. Therefore, the topic of the current Special Issue is more complex, providing a platform to gather information about macroinvertebrate communities, taxonomic groups or single species and their responses to various stressors linked to human activities.

Dr. Martin Bláha
Dr. Kateřina Grabicová
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • macroinvertebrates
  • ethology
  • ecology
  • human-altered habitats, xenobiotics

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Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

17 pages, 7903 KiB  
Article
Swin Transformer for Complex Coastal Wetland Classification Using the Integration of Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 Imagery
by Ali Jamali and Masoud Mahdianpari
Water 2022, 14(2), 178; https://doi.org/10.3390/w14020178 - 10 Jan 2022
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 3579
Abstract
The emergence of deep learning techniques has revolutionized the use of machine learning algorithms to classify complicated environments, notably in remote sensing. Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) have shown considerable promise in classifying challenging high-dimensional remote sensing data, particularly in the classification of wetlands. [...] Read more.
The emergence of deep learning techniques has revolutionized the use of machine learning algorithms to classify complicated environments, notably in remote sensing. Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) have shown considerable promise in classifying challenging high-dimensional remote sensing data, particularly in the classification of wetlands. State-of-the-art Natural Language Processing (NLP) algorithms, on the other hand, are transformers. Despite the fact that transformers have been utilized for a few remote sensing applications, they have not been compared to other well-known CNN networks in complex wetland classification. As such, for the classification of complex coastal wetlands in the study area of Saint John city, located in New Brunswick, Canada, we modified and employed the Swin Transformer algorithm. Moreover, the developed transformer classifier results were compared with two well-known deep CNNs of AlexNet and VGG-16. In terms of average accuracy, the proposed Swin Transformer algorithm outperformed the AlexNet and VGG-16 techniques by 14.3% and 44.28%, respectively. The proposed Swin Transformer classifier obtained F-1 scores of 0.65, 0.71, 0.73, 0.78, 0.82, 0.84, and 0.84 for the recognition of coastal marsh, shrub, bog, fen, aquatic bed, forested wetland, and freshwater marsh, respectively. The results achieved in this study suggest the high capability of transformers over very deep CNN networks for the classification of complex landscapes in remote sensing. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Freshwater Communities in Human-Altered Ecosystems)
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20 pages, 2419 KiB  
Article
Insecticides and Drought as a Fatal Combination for a Stream Macroinvertebrate Assemblage in a Catchment Area Exploited by Large-Scale Agriculture
by Marek Let, Jan Špaček, Martin Ferenčík, Antonín Kouba and Martin Bláha
Water 2021, 13(10), 1352; https://doi.org/10.3390/w13101352 - 13 May 2021
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2687
Abstract
This case study documents responses in a headwater macroinvertebrate assemblage to insecticide pollution and hydrological drought. In 2014, the Doubravka brook (Czech Republic) was damaged by a large overflow of a mixture of chlorpyrifos (CPS) and cypermethrin (CP). In 2016–2017, this brook was [...] Read more.
This case study documents responses in a headwater macroinvertebrate assemblage to insecticide pollution and hydrological drought. In 2014, the Doubravka brook (Czech Republic) was damaged by a large overflow of a mixture of chlorpyrifos (CPS) and cypermethrin (CP). In 2016–2017, this brook was then affected by severe drought that sometimes led to an almost complete absence of surface water. We found significant relationships between the strength of both these disturbances and the deeper taxonomic levels of both the overall macroinvertebrate assemblage (classes) and the arthropod assemblage alone (orders and dipteran families), as well as the functional feeding groups (FFGs). The CPS-CP contamination was mostly negatively correlated to arthropod and non-arthropod taxa and was positively correlated only with FFG collector-gatherers; on the other hand, the drought was negatively correlated to Simuliidae, Ephemeroptera, Trichoptera, and the FFG of grazer-scrapers and passive filterers. Drought conditions correlated most positively with Isopoda, Ostracoda, Heteroptera, adult Coleoptera, and predator and active filterer FFGs. The chosen eco-indicators (SPEARpesticides, SPEARrefuge, BMWP, and EPT) used as support information reveal the poor ecological status of the whole assemblage, including the control site, the cause of which is most likely to be the exploitation of the adjacent catchment area by large-scale agriculture. This type of agricultural exploitation will undoubtedly affect macroinvertebrate assemblages as a result of agrochemical and soil inputs during run-off events and will also exacerbate the effect of droughts when precipitation levels drop. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Freshwater Communities in Human-Altered Ecosystems)
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17 pages, 10013 KiB  
Article
How does Urban Pollution Influence Macroinvertebrate Traits in Forested Riverine Systems?
by Augustine O. Edegbene, Francis O. Arimoro and Oghenekaro N. Odume
Water 2020, 12(11), 3111; https://doi.org/10.3390/w12113111 - 5 Nov 2020
Cited by 22 | Viewed by 2919
Abstract
The influence of urbanization on macroinvertebrate traits was explored in forested rivers in the Niger Delta area of Nigeria. Physico-chemical variables were sampled on a monthly basis alongside macroinvertebrates in 20 sites of 11 rivers spanning 2008–2012. Physico-chemical variables were used to classify [...] Read more.
The influence of urbanization on macroinvertebrate traits was explored in forested rivers in the Niger Delta area of Nigeria. Physico-chemical variables were sampled on a monthly basis alongside macroinvertebrates in 20 sites of 11 rivers spanning 2008–2012. Physico-chemical variables were used to classify the 20 sites into three ecological classes, namely: least impacted sites (LIS), moderately impacted sites (MIS) and highly impacted sites (HIS) using principal component analysis. Our results based on RLQ (R = physico-chemical variables, L = macroinvertebrate taxa and Q = macroinvertebrate traits) and fourth-corner analyses revealed that large body size, grazing and hardshell were positively significantly associated with LIS on the RLQ. They were also either negatively correlated with any two of water temperature, nutrients, BOD5 and flow velocity or positively significantly correlated with increasing DO. Thus, these traits were considered sensitive to urban pollution in forested rivers. Burrowing, predation and pupa aquatic stage, which were positively associated with HIS, were also significantly negatively correlated with increasing DO, and were deemed tolerant of urban pollution in forested rivers. Box plots and a Kruskal–Wallis test revealed that the three sensitive traits were significantly highest at LIS (p < 0.05) except grazing; while the three tolerant traits were significantly highest at MIS (p < 0.05) except burrowing. Overall, this study revealed that urban pollution influences macroinvertebrate traits differently in forested rivers. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Freshwater Communities in Human-Altered Ecosystems)
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15 pages, 1645 KiB  
Article
Relationship between Environmental Conditions and Structure of Macroinvertebrate Community in a Hydromorphologically Altered Pre-Alpine River
by Igor Zelnik and Tjaša Muc
Water 2020, 12(11), 2987; https://doi.org/10.3390/w12112987 - 24 Oct 2020
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2633
Abstract
Hydromorphological alterations influence a wide range of environmental conditions as well as riparian vegetation and the structure of the macroinvertebrate community. We studied relationships between the structure and diversity of the macroinvertebrate community and hydromorphological and other environmental conditions in the river Gradaščica [...] Read more.
Hydromorphological alterations influence a wide range of environmental conditions as well as riparian vegetation and the structure of the macroinvertebrate community. We studied relationships between the structure and diversity of the macroinvertebrate community and hydromorphological and other environmental conditions in the river Gradaščica (central Slovenia). The Gradaščica river is a pre-Alpine torrential river that has been morphologically altered by humans. A selection of abiotic factors was measured, the ecomorphological status of the river was assessed, vegetation in the riparian zone was surveyed and benthic macroinvertebrates were sampled. Correlations between diversity and the structure of the macroinvertebrate community, environmental parameters and occurrence of invasive alien plant species in the riparian zone were identified. The significance of the influence of environmental parameters on the structure of the macroinvertebrate community was examined. We found that hydromorphological alterations in the river have had a significant influence on the diversity and composition of the macroinvertebrate community because of changes of flow velocity and the spread of invasive alien plant species that has followed those changes. Factors that also significantly influence the composition of macroinvertebrate community are distance from the source and conductivity. Our findings suggest minimization of further human hydromorphological changes of watercourses could prevent the loss of biodiversity of riverine ecosystems. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Freshwater Communities in Human-Altered Ecosystems)
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