Abstract
Streams and rivers cover a larger proportion of the Earth’s surface but are highly affected by human pressures. Conversely, bioassessment methods are in their infancy in developing countries such as Ethiopia. In this study, we compared 2- and 3-min macroinvertebrate kick samples at multiple locations for both riffle habitat (RH) and multihabitat (MH) approaches. The performance of each method was evaluated statistically using benthic macroinvertebrate metrics and diversity indices. Results of the Kruskal–Wallis analysis in this study showed no significant differences among methods tested in minimally impacted streams in Ethiopia and generally performed equally irrespective of the methods employed except for total abundances and Ephemeroptera abundances. Furthermore, multivariate analysis of the relative abundances of macroinvertebrate communities using analysis of similarity (ANOSIM), RELATE, non-metric multidimensional scaling (MDS), and classification strength-sampling method comparability (CS-SMC) indicated a high similarity in the macroinvertebrate communities recorded among all methods employed in this study area. However, the index of multivariate dispersion (IMD) test showed variations in relative abundances of macroinvertebrate communities among the methods. In summary, if the focus is not on rare taxa and the required information is not dependent on additional evidence provided by the use of lower taxonomic levels of identification (genus and species), the results of the present study support the use of the shorter 2-min RH kick sampling method for the bioassessment of wadeable rivers and streams in Ethiopia.
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The dataset generated and/or analyzed during the present study is available from the corresponding author.
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Acknowledgements
This study was partly funded by Addis Ababa University (AAU), Ethiopia. The logistic support including different dissection microscopes and expert training on data management and macroinvertebrate identification by the University College Dublin (UCD), Ireland, has also been acknowledged. The Ethiopian Institute of Water Resources (EIWR), Jimma University (JU), and Wollo University (WU), Ethiopia, also supported the transportation service and several other logistics during the data collection season. The authors also wish to thank the staff at UCD, AAU, JU, and WU for their helpful cooperation in the arrangement of laboratory facilities and offices.
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Getachew, M., Mulat, W.L., Mereta, S.T. et al. Refining benthic macroinvertebrate kick sampling protocol for wadeable rivers and streams in Ethiopia. Environ Monit Assess 194, 196 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-021-09594-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-021-09594-x