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REFERENCE CONDITION APPROACH TO THE ASSESSMENT OF BIOLOGICAL INTEGRITY IN STREAMS OF THE SOUTHERN ROCKY MOUNTAINS AND ITS USE IN MEASURING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF MILE-REMEDIATION EFFORTS
Citation:
Leland, H. V., A R. Selle, AND M. B. Griffith. REFERENCE CONDITION APPROACH TO THE ASSESSMENT OF BIOLOGICAL INTEGRITY IN STREAMS OF THE SOUTHERN ROCKY MOUNTAINS AND ITS USE IN MEASURING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF MILE-REMEDIATION EFFORTS. Presented at Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, Nashville, TN, November 12-16, 2000.
Impact/Purpose:
The goal of this research is to develop methods and indicators that are useful for evaluating the condition of aquatic communities, for assessing the restoration of aquatic communities in response to mitigation and best management practices, and for determining the exposure of aquatic communities to different classes of stressors (i.e., pesticides, sedimentation, habitat alteration).
Description:
A recent development in water quality assessment is the comparison of assemblage data from impacted stream segments with that for groups of segments representing reference (or minimally-impacted) conditions. The degree of impairment of a stream segment is expressed as metrics, such as the ratio of observed to expected (O/E) resident fauna. We examined the distribution of benthic invertebrates in streams of the southern Rocky Mountains physiographic province, Colorado, in relation to lithology, land cover, proximity to mines, water and sediment quality, and in-stream and riparian habitat. Our objective was to examine the potential for use of this method in monitoring the effectiveness of mine-remediation efforts based on data from approximately 50 reference segments and 85 moderately-impacted to impacted segments in the province. We used datasets from Regional EMAP and NAWQA studies conducted during the years 1994-1998. The results of this investigation are used to define requirements of a biomonitoring program to measure the effectiveness of mine-remediaton efforts in restoring biological resources of impacted streams and rivers of the Rocky Mountains.