The last natural eastern river?
Importance of transboundary protected
areas in the conservation of biodiversity
Is
it the sustainable coexistence between aquatic insects and people possible in
the city area?
European refuges of
entomofauna – caddisflies (Trichoptera) in protected area in Central and
Large
lowland rivers, with flooded valley not changed by human activity, are very
rare in
Caddisflies were
investigated during spring, summer and autumn in 1997-99, on 40 localities,
situated between Lida and
2355 larvae, pupa
and imagines of Trichoptera from 74 species were collected (about 60%
Belarussian species). In the qualitative analyse, fauna of rivers and streams,
water bodies on valley (oxbows, temporary pools) and springs were
distinguished. In the quantitative analyze, water bodies with poor fauna
(springs and artificial waters) were distinguished very close. Caddisflies of
the
Basis
on some different analyses there were distinguished different assemblages,
typical for various habitats: potamal and rthitral zone. Different dominant
species occur in all this assemblages. Effect of “neighboring waters bodies”
and animal’s migrations were showed for all waters bodies occurring in a
lowland river valley. Life strategies of caddisflies were analysed. It could be
expected that relative eurytop strategies and wide geographical distribution of
some caddisflies (possibility to inhabiting various waters: running and
standing water bodies) are adaptation to live in changing post-glacial
landscape (a
Transboundary
protected areas have a great importance for international
cooperation in protection of species diversity and typical for
Basis on analyse of
caddisfly fauna occurring in protected areas in Poland (national parks,
landscape parks, natural reserve) we can say, that existing protected area are
not enough for preserve a biodiversity. All our material describes caddisfly
fauna from 17 national parks, 6 landscape parks and 6 reserves of nature. Some
of national parks, the most of landscape parks and all reserves of nature still
need to be investigated. Till now, 239 species were found within all protected
areas of
Additionally way for
biodiversity protection is a creation new, transboundary protected areas
including some “national” protected areas as soon as not protected areas with
less human activity. For example the
Caddisflies
(Insecta: Trichoptera) are one of the most important aquatic groups that
inhabit lake littorals. The ecological significance of Trichoptera in lakes results
from the large quantity of larvae, their relatively large partition in the
littroral macrobenthos biomass and their presence among most functional feeding
groups.
The paper presents
the results if multi-year research into caddis-flies inhabiting Polish lakes,
including the species composition and
the structure of habitat distribution. It is also an attempt to answer the
following questions: what are the species occur in Polish lakes, what is the
grade of specify of lake fauna and there
any differences in larvae distribution in lakes differing in regional location,
in trophy type and catchment’s basin? The question of fauna origin, including
the regions, environmental and life-history styles was brought up. The authors
also tried to formulate the general principles (patterns) of caddis larvae
distribution in lakes. This work is the first to provide relatively full
characteristics of larvae distribution in Polish lakes and the first such work
on European lakes. Due to the fact that littoral distribution of other
invertebrates have not been described well, this work opens the discussion on
macrobenthos distribution in lakes.
The research
material comprises close to 70 thousands caddis larvae and adults, collected between
1951 and 1997 from around 200 lakes located across
The analysis of the
available data showed that 60% of the species (154 species) of the national
caddisfly fauna is co-related to lakes. The author suggests distinguishing
three ecological groups as follows: limnepbionts (lake species, exclusively or
mainly occurring in lakes), limnephilous )often and numerously occurring in
lakes) and limnexens (accidentally occurring in lakes) bearing in mind that
division lines between them are not sharp. Among the 49 limnepbionts, almost
all species occur widely in regions located in lowlands. Most of the limnebionts
inhabit the elodeids (32 species), a large number of them inhabit helophytes
(25) and few of them inhabit the shallowest littoral. Among the 39
limnephilous, as many as 31 occur widely and a few of them occur in narrow
areas and mountains. The lagest quantity of limnephilous are connected with the
potamal zone (25 species), less with rhitral (7) small water bodies (4) or with
peat-bog water (2). Limnephilous inhabit mainly the shallowest, not overgrown
littoral (10 species) and the helophytes (15), more seldom elodeis (5). In the
group of limnexens (66 species) only around half of the species occurred widely
and 8 species occurred in narrower ranges and in mountains. Seven of the
limnexens are connected with springs (crenal), 20 of them with steams (rhitral
zone), 23 with rivers (potamal zone), 10 of the with small water bodies and 6
with marsh waters. Clearly most of the species are connected with the
shallowest, not overgrown littoral (30 species), less with the helophytes (15)
and only 4 with elodeids. 22 species were also distinguished in relation to
dystrophic and marsh waters (tyrphobionts and tyrphilous).
Analyzed caddisfly
fauna can be described as relatively eurytopic and widely-occurring with
numerous species of northern distribution. The most specific fauna inhabits
dipper littoral of lakes (elodeids zone) and to a lesser extent the helophytes.
The largest quantity of accidental species is present in the shallowest, not
overgrown littoral (mainly in mountain lakes with low trophy).
Three levels of differentiation could be distinguished
in the larvae distribution characteristics: geographic (regional), landscape
(lake type and influence of the surrounding) and habitatual (habitats in
lakes). The levels illustrate the three dispersion aspect. The geographical
differentiation may result from climatic and historic differences (post0glacial
species dispersion). The landscape differentiation may have been caused by the
influence of fauna migration from the other water habitats neighboring with
lakes (e.g. from rivers, peat-bogs, fens, canals) and it could be also
interpreted as adaptation to life in a changing landscape, or possibility as
living in water habitats of different types which neighbors with each other in
the Lakeland landscape and in a valley of gig lowland rivers (lakes, rivers,
temporary pools etc.).
Stanisław Czachorowski
Lech Pietrzak
University of Warmia and Mazury
Department of Ecology and Environmental
Protection
Plac Lodzki 3; 10-727 Olsztyn; POLAND
e-mails: stanislaw.czachorowski@uwm.edu.pl , lpietrzak@wp.pl
Introduction
Water resources, water
ecosystems and water management have a very special place in the efforts of
countries in the Baltic Sea region, as soon as in Masurian Lake District
(northern
The urbanization
process drastically changes the natural ecosystems. Water insects in cities
depend on the modifications of the natural water reservoirs and the quality of
anthropogenic ones. The development of the city area decides on preserving or
destruction of the natural fauna. So, it is very important question: is a
sustainable development a chance for the coexistence of the people and the
insects? Additionally is very difficult to implement sustainable water and
wetland systems without understanding aquatic entomofauna dynamics.
About 3340 species of aquatic insects live in
Materials and methods
Two towns:
Złocieniec and
Caddis larvae were
caught by standard, hydrobiological methods and adults by an entomological net
in the vicinity of water bodies. The larvae were selected in the terrain and
preserved in 70% alcohol. They were recognized later in the laboratory.
The naturalness of
the fauna was assessed by naturality indexes (Czachorowski, Buczyński 1999).
The naturality indexes are quite new method, which was worked out on the basis
of Fisher’s biocenosis naturality indexes (Fischer 1996). There are
two naturality indexes: quantitative naturality index (Wni) and qualitative
naturality index (Wns). They can have value from 1 to 16.
,
Wns - qualitative naturality index,
Wni - quantitative naturality index,
Wzei - coefficient of ecological importance for i species
in given biocenose,
s - number of all species in given biocenose,
ni - number of
specimens of i species,
N - number of all specimens of all species in given
biocenose (number of all founded specimens).
The biodiversity of examined fauna was calculated
using index of Shannon-Weaver.
H’ – Index of Shannon-Weaver
pi – ratio of i species
n – number of species
Results
7740 specimens of
caddis flies (7473 larvae and 267 adults) were caught. There were 5997
specimens from
The rare and
endangered species were found in the both cities (according to Szczęsny 1992).
There were two endangered species and three rare species in
In Złocieniec the
most natural fauna occurred in
The naturality
indexes calculated for examined water bodies are comparable to indexes
calculated for water bodies from “natural” areas (Fig. 2).
In Złocieniec the
highest biodiversity indexes had fauna from rivers,
Similar to the
naturality indexes, the biodiversity of examined waterbodies is comparable to
biodiversity of ones from “natural” areas (fig. 3).
It is worth to pay
attention to
Discussion
Today, tourism and
recreation form a dominating part of the service sector (Adolfsson et al.
2000). Planning for tourism and recreation attempts to balance the interests of
the tourism and recreation sector with other sectors and minimise environmental
impact. Our result suggest that water bodies in urban area can play important
role in preservation of biodiversity. In artificial waters (e.g. clay pits) and
water bodies changed by human activity live many aquatic insects, including
rare and endangered species. So, urban area are important in management of
nature protection.
The results show,
that vulnerable species and natural fauna of the water insects can be preserved
within the urban areas. Natural fauna and rare species have been found in
recultivated lakes in
The investigations
are continued. We are looking for cooperation and comparative investigations on
other group of animals and plants, and in additional towns in different
landscapes in Baltic Sea Region.
Literature
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E., Holmberg
Czachorowski S., P. Buczyński, 1999:
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Zagrożenia i ochrona owadów wodnych w Polsce. Wiad. Entomol., 18,
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