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Influence of Macrophyte Complexity and Environmental Variables on Macroinvertebrate Assemblages Across a Subtropical Wetland System

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Abstract

Different architectures in aquatic plants with different levels of morphological complexity provide environmental heterogeneity in freshwater ecosystems, and consequently influence invertebrate assemblages. We investigated the relative importance of the structural complexity of macrophytes and environmental variables on the abundance and richness of the macroinvertebrate assemblages associated with aquatic plants across the Esteros del Iberá. This protected wetland system located in Corrientes (Argentina) is fed by rain. Macrophyte habitat complexity was quantified by measuring fractal geometry dimensions of area and perimeter and plant biomass. We sampled macroinvertebrates associated with five species of macrophyte (Egeria najas, Cabomba caroliniana, Potamogeton gayi, Eichhornia azurea and Salvinia biloba) in five shallow lakes during two different seasons (dry and rainy) between 2007 and 2008. Regression analyses revealed that macrophyte structural complexity was an important factor on macroinvertebrate assemblages, whereas explanatory power of environmental variables was low. In both seasons, the fractal dimension of area was the variable with the highest explanatory power on richness, and plant biomass was in the case of macroinvertebrate abundance. To conserve macroinvertebrate diversity in Esteros del Iberá, it would be necessary to maintain the natural heterogeneity indicated by the different structural complexities of the macrophytes across the wetland.

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Data Availability

All data will be available at CONICET repository after acceptation of the manuscript.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Juan José Neiff for his valuable critical review. Since the creation of the provincial reserve Iberá, many specialists collaborated with the systematic identification of invertebrates A. Bachmann (in memorian), M. Archangelsky, Ch. O’Brien, O. Flint (in memorian), W. Peters, E. Domínguez, ME, Varela, A. Paggi, C. Armúa, P. Collins, whom we thank for their work and for sending the reference material. We also thanks to staff and park rangers to “Reserva del Iberá” for their valuable support during the surveys and C. Giese for your statistic support.

We thank to the associated editor, one anonymous reviewer and K. Kovalenko for their constructive suggestions.

Funding

This study was funded by the BBVA Foundation Bilbao under projects IBERAQUA (ref. BIOCON 04-100/05) and PI 18Q004 (Secretaría General de Ciencia y Técnica, Universidad Nacional del Nordeste).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro de Ecología Aplicada del Litoral (CONICET-UNNE), Ruta 5, Km 2.5, 3400, Corrientes, Argentina

    Alicia S. G. Poi, Luciana I. Gallardo, Sylvina L. Casco & Lara M. Sabater

  2. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales y Agrimensura, Universidad Nacional del Nordeste, Avenida Libertad 5470, 3400, Corrientes, Argentina

    Luciana I. Gallardo & Sylvina L. Casco

  3. Departamento de Biología, Facultad de Ciencias del Mar y Ambientales, Instituto Universitario de Investigación Marina (INMAR), Campus de Excelencia Internacional del Mar (CEI-MAR), Universidad de Cádiz, 11510, Puerto Real, Spain

    Bárbara Úbeda

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  1. Alicia S. G. Poi
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  2. Luciana I. Gallardo
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  3. Sylvina L. Casco
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  4. Lara M. Sabater
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  5. Bárbara Úbeda
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Contributions

A.S.G. Poi, S.L. Casco and B. Úbeda participated equally in the conception or design of this study, as well as in the acquisition, analysis and interpretation of the data. L.I. Gallardo and L.M. Sabater contributed substantially to invertebrate identification and statistical processing.

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Correspondence to Sylvina L. Casco.

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Poi, A.S.G., Gallardo, L.I., Casco, S.L. et al. Influence of Macrophyte Complexity and Environmental Variables on Macroinvertebrate Assemblages Across a Subtropical Wetland System. Wetlands 41, 105 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-021-01508-4

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