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EXAMINING ASSOCIATIONS BETWEEN FISH ASSEMBLAGES AND PHYSICAL HABITAT
Citation:
Kaufmann, P R. EXAMINING ASSOCIATIONS BETWEEN FISH ASSEMBLAGES AND PHYSICAL HABITAT. Presented at Biointegrity and Biomonitoring session of Brasilian Ichthyological Congress, Sao Leopoldo, Brasil, January 7-12, 2001.
Description:
Assessing lotic fish-habitat interactions from regional survey data requires that we consider a comprehensive representation, at the appropriate scale, of the likely controls on fish assemblages. At the scale of stream and river reaches, the important dimensions of physical habitat structure include habitat space, stream power, habitat complexity and cover, substrate, riparian vegetation, human disturbances, and channel-floodplain interaction. Within a region, fish assemblage composition is limited by the available species pool -- a product of geography, climate, history and evolution. However, both fish assemblages and habitat are strongly controlled by prevailing natural geography and climate. Analytically, the effects of human disturbances on fish and habitat in a region are best measured as deviations from this natural geoclimatic template.