Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

An initial assessment of drought sensitivity in Amazonian fish communities

  • Primary Research Paper
  • Published:
Hydrobiologia Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The Amazon River Basin encompasses the world’s largest remaining tropical rainforest, and the largest freshwater system with the highest fish species diversity on earth, but global climate change is predicted to cause the loss of 7–12% of fish species by 2070. The severe drought anomaly of 2005, caused by warming of Atlantic surface waters, provided a unique opportunity to examine the impact of a major climatic disturbance on a tropical fish assemblage. We monitored fish species diversity in six Brazilian floodplain lakes along the Solimões River from 2004 to 2007 (before, during, and after drought). Statistical analysis revealed changes in species composition of these lakes following the drought, with both positive and negative responses observed. The response to drought was not uniform among species with regard to trophic guild or migratory behavior. SIMPER analysis showed that planktivores on the average increased in abundance in the years following the drought, carnivores and omnivores decreased, and herbivores and detritivores increased. Some of these changes were transitory, others persisted through monitoring. Migratory species disproportionately increased in abundance post-drought compared to non-migratory species. Interlake (β) diversity of fish declined during the drought year, indicating that lakes were becoming less heterogeneous in species composition, but showed a trend toward recovery of pre-drought level in the following years. According to both global climate change models and recent experience, the intensity and frequency of droughts in this region of the world is increasing. Given the sensitivity of resident fish species to the single, short-term, perturbation reported here, assessment of how tropical freshwater fish populations respond to drought will be crucial to understanding the consequences of this kind of perturbation to these communities and to the human inhabitants who depend upon this important protein source.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Batista, V. S., A. J. Inhamuns, C. E. C. Freitas & D. Freire-Brasil, 1998. Characterization of the fishery in river communities in the low-Solimões/high-Amazon region. Fisheries Management and Ecology 5: 419–435.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beissner, B. E., P. R. Peres-Neto, E. S. Lindstrom, A. Barnett & M. L. Longhi, 2006. The role of environmental and spatial processes in structuring lake communities from bacteria to fish. Ecology 87: 2985–2991.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bradshaw, C. J. A., N. S. Sodhi & B. W. Brook, 2009. Tropical turmoil: a biodiversity tragedy in progress. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 7: 79–87.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chao, N. L., P. Petry, G. Prang, L. Sonnenschein & M. Tlusty, 2001. Conservation and management of ornamental fish resources of the Rio Negro Basin, Amazonia, Brasil (Project Piaba). Proceeding of the International Workshop on Amazon River Biodiversity, Editoria da universidade do Amazonas, Manaus, Brazil.

  • Charney, N. & S. Record, 2010. Vegetarian: Jost Diversity Measures for Community Data. R Package Version 1.2. http://CRAN.R-project.org/package=vegetarian.

  • Chellappa, S., M. R. Camara & N. T. Chellappa, 2003. Ecology of Cichla monoculus (Osteichthyes: Cichlidae) from a reservoir in the semi-arid region of Brazil. Hydrobiologia 504: 267–273.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Clarke, K. R., 1993. Non-parametric multivariate analyses of changes in community structure. Australian Journal of Ecology 18: 117–143.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Clarke, K. R. & R. N. Gorley, 2006. PRIMER v6: User Manual/Tutorial. PRIMER-E, Plymouth.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cox, P. M., P. P. Harris, C. Huntingford, R. A. Betts, M. Collins, C. D. Jones, T. E. Jupp, J. A. Marengo & C. A. Nobre, 2008. Increasing risk of Amazonian drought due to decreasing aerosol pollution. Nature 453: 212–215.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Davis, J. M., A. D. Rosemond, S. L. Eggert, W. F. Cross & J. B. Wallace, 2010. Long-term nutrient enrichment decouples predator and prey production. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 107: 121–126.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • deRuiter, P. C., V. Wolters, J. C. Moore & K. O. Winemiller, 2005. Food web ecology: playing Jenga and beyond. Science 309: 68–71.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Dudgeon, D. A., A. H. Arthington, M. O. Gessner, Z.-I. Kawabata, D. J. Knowler, C. Lévêque, R. J. Naiman, A.-H. Prieur-Richard, D. Soto, M. J. L. Stiassny & C. A. Sullivan, 2006. Freshwater biodiversity: importance, threats, status and conservation challenges. Biological Review 81: 163–182.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freitas, C. E. C. & R. C. S. Garcez, 2004. Fish communities of natural canals between floodplain lakes and Solimões-Amazonas River. Acta Limnologica Brasiliensia 16: 273–280.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freitas, C. E. C., F. K. Siqueira-Souza, K. L. L. Prado, K. C. Yamamoto & L. E. Hurd, 2010. Factors determining fish species diversity in Amazonian floodplain lakes. In Rojas, N. & R. Prieto (eds), Amazon Basin: Plant Life, Wildlife and Environment. Nova Science Publishers, New York: 41–76.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hoeinghaus, D. J., C. A. Layman, D. A. Arrington & K. O. Winemiller, 2003. Spatiotemporal variation in fish assemblage structure in tropical floodplain creeks. Environmental Biology of Fishes 67: 379–387.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hoorn, C., et al., 2010. Amazonia through time: Andean uplift, climate change, landscape evolution, and biodiversity. Science 330: 927–931.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Jenkins, M., 2003. Prospects for biodiversity. Science 302: 1175–1177.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Jost, L., 2006. Entropy and diversity. Oikos 113: 363–375.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jost, L., 2007. Partitioning diversity into independent alpha and beta components. Ecology 88: 2427–2439.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Junk, W. J., O. B. Bayley & R. E. Sparks, 1989. The flood pulse concept in river floodplain system. Canadian Special Publication of Fisheries and Aquatic Science 106: 110–127.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kruskal, J. B., 1964. Multidimensional scaling by optimizing goodness of fit to a nonmetric hypothesis. Psychometrika 29: 1–27.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Latini, A. O. & M. Petrere, 2004. Reduction of a native fish fauna by alien species: an example from Brazilian freshwater tropical lakes. Fisheries Management and Ecology 11: 71–79.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Malhi, Y., J. T. Roberts, R. A. Betts, T. J. Killeen, W. Li & C. A. Nobre, 2008. Climate change, deforestation, and the fate of the Amazon. Science 319: 169–172.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Marengo, J. A., C. A. Nobre, J. Tomasella, M. D. Oyama, G. S. de Oliveira, R. de Oliveira, H. Carmago, L. M. Alves & I. F. Brown, 2008. The drought of Amazonia in 2005. Journal of Climatology 21: 495–516.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Parmesan, C., 2006. Ecological and evolutionary responses to recent climate change. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics 37: 637–669.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Phillips, O. L., et al., 2009. Drought sensitivity of the Amazon rainforest. Science 323: 1344–1347.

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Pittock, J., L. J. Hansen & R. Abell, 2008. Running dry: freshwater biodiversity, protected areas and climate change. Biodiversity 9: 30–39.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • R Development Core Team, 2010. R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. ISBN 3-900051-07-0. http://www.R-project.org.

  • Reis, R. E., S. O. Kullander & C. J. Ferraris Jr, 2003. Check List of the Freshwater Fishes of South and Central America. Edipucrs, Porto Alegre.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rodríguez, M. A. & W. M. Lewis Jr, 1997. Structure of fish assemblages along environmental gradients in floodplain lakes of the Orinoco River. Ecological Monographs 67: 109–128.

    Google Scholar 

  • Salazar, L. F., C. A. Nobre & M. D. Oyama, 2007. Climate change consequences on the biome distribution in tropical South America. Geophysical Research Letters 34: L0970.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Siqueira-Souza, F. K. & C. E. C. Freitas, 2004. Fish diversity of floodplain lakes on the lower stretch of the Solimões river. Brazilian Journal of Biology 64: 501–510.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Soares, M. G. M., E. L. Costa, F. K. Siqueira-Souza, H. D. B. Anjos, K. C. Yamamoto & C. E. C. Freitas, 2007. Peixes de lagos do médio rio Solimões. EDUA, Manaus, Brazil.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sousa, R. G. C. & C. E. C. Freitas, 2008. The influence of flood pulse on fish communities of floodplain canals in the middle Solimões River, Brazil. Neotropical Ichthyology 6: 249–255.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tejerina-Garro, F. L., R. Fortin & M. A. Rodríguez, 1998. Fish community structure in relation to environmental variation in floodplain lakes of the Araguaia River, Amazon Basin. Environmental Biology of Fishes 51: 399–410.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Val, A. L. & V. M. F. Almeida-Val, 1995. Fishes of the Amazon and Their Environment: Physiological and Biochemical Aspects. Springer, Heidelberg.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Winemiller, K. O., 2004. Floodplain river food webs: generalizations and implications for fisheries management. Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on the Management of Large Rivers for Fisheries Volume II. Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok, Thailand (RAP Publication 2004/16): 285–309.

Download references

Acknowledgments

We thank I. Santos, W. Dias, J. Pena, K. Prado, and A. Resk for help in field work. We also thank J. Knox, B. Forsberg, J. Zuanon, and K. Winemiller for critical reading of previous versions of the manuscript. Supported by grants 0.1.04.0567.00 and 0.1.06.1223.00 from the PIATAM Project, funded by FINEP and Petrobras, Brazil to CECF, and by a Lenfest grant from Washington & Lee University, USA to LEH.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Universidade Federal do Amazonas, Av. Gen. Rodrigo Otávio, 3000, 69077-000, Manaus, AM, Brazil

    Carlos E. C. Freitas & Flávia K. Siqueira-Souza

  2. Department of Biology and Environmental Studies Program, Washington and Lee University, Lexington, VA, 24450, USA

    Robert Humston

  3. Department of Biology, Washington and Lee University, Lexington, VA, 24450, USA

    Lawrence E. Hurd

Authors
  1. Carlos E. C. Freitas
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Flávia K. Siqueira-Souza
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Robert Humston
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Lawrence E. Hurd
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lawrence E. Hurd.

Additional information

Handling editor: David Dudgeon

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Freitas, C.E.C., Siqueira-Souza, F.K., Humston, R. et al. An initial assessment of drought sensitivity in Amazonian fish communities. Hydrobiologia 705, 159–171 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-012-1394-4

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-012-1394-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation