Implications of concordance for assessing aquatic communities at three nested spatial scales in Minnesota, USA

Implications of concordance for assessing aquatic communities at three nested spatial scales in Minnesota, USA

2010

Despite the large number of studies evaluating concordance between aquatic communities in various geographic contexts, very few studies have examined how patterns in community concordance relate to the patterns in community condition portrayed by the biotic indices used to monitor aquatic systems. We analyzed fish and macroinvertebrate data from 705 stream sites in Minnesota, USA to determine the level of concordance between the two assemblages across three nested spatial scales (statewide, ecoregion, and watershed). We also built predictive (RIVPACS) models for the two assemblages and evaluated whether concordant communities exhibited similar trends in the loss of taxa relative to reference conditions across all three scales. Finally, we evaluated the importance of various environmental variables in structuring the composition of both communities. Significant concordance between fish and macroinvertebrate communities occurred across all three scales, but concordance at a given scale was not consistently associated with significant relationships between fish and invertebrate O/E scores at that same scale. Fish and macroinvertebrate communities were largely controlled by different environmental variables, although stream size was frequently an important variable in structuring both communities.

Dolph, Christine L.
Huff, David D.
Chizinski, Christopher J.
Vondracek, Bruce

U of M

Advancing the Science of Limnology and Oceanography

2

Water Education, Outreach & Community Capacity

aquatic invertebrate
aquatic invertebrates
Macroinvertebrate Indicator
Macroinvertebrate Indicators
Macroinvertebrate-Indicator
Macroinvertebrate-Indicators
MI
M.I
MIs
M.Is
aquatic community
aquatic communities
aquatic habitat
aquatic habitats
fish
fishes
fish communities
water biology & aquatic habitat
water biology and aquatic habitat
water biology & aquatic habitats
water biology and aquatic habitats
Fish Habitat
Fish-Habitat
Fish habitats

2010-2019

No

Public Domain

Minnesota Water Research Digital Library