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Estuarine Macroinvertebrate Pollution Indicator Species in the Virginian Biogeographic Province
Citation:
PELLETIER, M. C., A. J. Gold, J. HELTSHE, AND H. BUFFUM. Estuarine Macroinvertebrate Pollution Indicator Species in the Virginian Biogeographic Province. Presented at Coastal and Estuarine Research Federation 20th Biennial Conference, Portland, OR, November 01 - 05, 2009.
Impact/Purpose:
Macroinvertebrates are commonly used as biomonitors to detect pollution impacts in estuaries. The goal of this research was to identify estuarine benthic invertebrates that could be used as indicator species to detect presence or absence of pollution in the Virginian Biogeographic Province using available monitoring data from the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program. Our empirically-based results corresponded well with other studies that identified tolerance values or indicator species. One advantage of this technique is that it can be used on smaller data sets, assuming that there are not major habitat differences among the samples. We believe that this parsimonious technique can be applied to other coastal areas where midsize (100 - 500 stations) monitoring data sets are available.
Description:
Macroinvertebrates are commonly used as biomonitors to detect pollution impacts in estuaries. In this study we identified estuarine benthic invertebrates that could be used to detect presence or absence of pollution in the Virginian Biogeographic Province using available monitoring data from the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program. We summarized the benthic community by ordination and projecting the results onto a pollution gradient. We modified the approach in a few ways. First, we subdivided by habitat. Second, we compared medians and corrected interquartile ranges (IQR/median) to identify indicator species that were sensitive to pollution (or lack thereof) and showed low variation in response. Our data set was divided into smaller subsets that ranged from 108 to 532 stations per habitat. Out of 707 species in the Virginian Province, 67 were identified as indicator species; 37 pollution sensitive taxa and 30 pollution indicative taxa. The pollution sensitive taxa were represented by more phyla than were the pollution indicative taxa. The pollution indicative taxa were dominated by deposit feeders while the pollution sensitive taxa were not dominated by animals using any one feeding strategy. The pollution sensitive taxa included many crustaceans which tend to be sensitive to pollution, while the pollution indicative taxa included many tubificid oligochaetes which are common indicators of pollution. Our empirically-based results corresponded well with other studies that identified tolerance values or indicator species. One advantage of this technique is that it can be used on smaller data sets, assuming that there are not major habitat differences among the samples. We believe that this parsimonious technique can be applied to other coastal areas where midsize (100 - 500 stations) monitoring data sets are available.