HR: 14:45h
AN: B43B-06    [Abstracts]
TI: Longitudinal Patterns in Benthic Macroinvertebrate Community Structure: A Southern Appalachian Wild and Scenic River Continuum (USA: GA, NC, SC)
AU: * Chiao, E
EM: chiao@uga.edu
AF: University of Georgia, Department of Entomology, 413 Biological Sciences Building, Athens, GA 30605 United States
AU: Wallace, J B
EM: jbwallace@uga.edu
AF: University of Georgia, Department of Entomology, 413 Biological Sciences Building, Athens, GA 30605 United States
AB: As human activities on the landscape continue to alter characteristics of natural systems, it becomes increasingly important to directly measure ecosystem properties. Our objective was to evaluate benthic macroinvertebrate community structure in context of reach position along the longitudinal profile of a wild and scenic river. Trends in taxonomic richness, diversity, and habitat weighted abundance and biomass of benthic macroinvertebrate functional groups were examined in three dominant habitats at four study reaches within the Chattooga River watershed over one year. The continuum began at a first order stream (1:24 000 scale map) and continued into the main channel of the Chattooga River. Macroinvertebrate abundance and biomass was greatest at the first order stream (30,946 ind. m^-2; 947 mg AFDM m^-2). Gatherers were the most abundant functional group, accounting for 62 - 80 % of reach-scale communities at each study site. Biomass of all functional groups tended to decrease with increasing reach size, except for filterers whose biomass increased. Habitat weighted functional group biomass along the continuum matched some, but not all, predictions of the river continuum concept which postulates that physical and biotic properties of pristine river networks change predictably along a longitudinal profile.
DE: 9810 New fields (not classifiable under other headings)
DE: 9902 NABS Student Award Applied Research
SC: Biogeosciences [B]
MN: 2005 Joint Assembly