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Critical Thermal Maxima of aquatic macroinvertebrates: towards identifying bioindicators of thermal alteration

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Abstract

Water temperature is an important abiotic driver of aquatic ecosystems. It influences many aspects of an organism’s existence including its growth, feeding and metabolic rates; emergence; fecundity; behaviour and ultimately survival. All organisms have an optimum temperature range within which they survive and are able to thrive. Determining upper thermal limits provides insight into the relative sensitivity of organisms to elevated temperatures. Thermally sensitive taxa may be useful as bioindicators of thermal alteration and used in the generation of target thermal thresholds for aquatic systems. This study determined the upper thermal limit (CTmax) of a range of aquatic macroinvertebrates from rivers in the south-western Cape, South Africa, using the dynamic Critical Thermal Method. The study focused on the taxonomic level of family as an initial screening tool for ranking thermal sensitivity. Of the 27 families examined, four were both thermally sensitive and highly suitable as test organisms, including Paramelitidae, Notonemouridae, Teloganodidae and Philopotamidae. Five families were moderately sensitive and highly suitable, including Palaemonidae, Heptageniidae, Leptophlebiidae, Corydalidae and Aeshnidae. Preliminary experiments to determine potential sources of variation in CTmax revealed that thermal sensitivity was relatively uniform within families, but that acclimation temperature influenced CTmax. Further investigation of the influence of thermal history, acclimation temperature and rate of temperature change on CTmax is necessary. Target water temperatures for river management will be derived using CTmax data, in addition to longer duration experimental data, which will be linked to in situ temperature data.

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Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the funding provided by the Water Research Commission and the office and laboratory facilities provided by the Department of Zoology, University of Cape Town. Thanks are also due to Dr Denise Schael who assisted with the species identifications; Evans Simasiku and Zoma Anne Ketley who undertook some of the laboratory experiments; and Vere Ross-Gillespie who undertook some of the field collections. The authors thank two anonymous referees and Núria Bonada for their useful comments on previous drafts of this manuscript.

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  1. Freshwater Research Unit, Department of Zoology, University of Cape Town, Private Bag X3, Rondebosch, 7700, South Africa

    Helen F. Dallas

  2. P.O. Box 152, Hilton, 3245, South Africa

    Nicholas A. Rivers-Moore

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  1. Helen F. Dallas
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  2. Nicholas A. Rivers-Moore
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Correspondence to Helen F. Dallas.

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Handling editor: Núria Bonada

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Dallas, H.F., Rivers-Moore, N.A. Critical Thermal Maxima of aquatic macroinvertebrates: towards identifying bioindicators of thermal alteration. Hydrobiologia 679, 61–76 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-011-0856-4

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