Hyphoreic ecology and altered landscapes

Introduction

The hyporheic zone is an ecotone at the interaction of surface and groundwater. This is an area of dynamic temporal and spatial fluxes and thus provides habitat conditions related to but different from the two parent environments. This zone is biologically active and has gained recent interest in its nitrogen attenuation capacity. It is also, however, a habitat where organisms live and thrive. There is a growing interest in understanding this shallow subterranean system and how it interacts with both deeper groundwaters and streams. Currently, only benthic invertebrates are used for assessing the biological quality of British streams. Given that the subsurface production is substantial and can even exceed surface production in some streams, such assessment may inappropriately categorize some waterbodies.

Aim

The current aim of my research is to assess how hyporheic invertebrate communities differ over a spatial scale and varying human impacts compared to the variation of the benthic invertebrate communities over the same area.

Approach

Sites were selected throughout the Don catchment to coincide with benthic invertebrate sampling. Hyporheic invertebrate samples were collected using a mobile standpipe and hand-vacuum pump design. Samples will then be sorted and identified down to lowest practical taxa. Benthic samples were collected using a divided 3 minute kick net sampling process, similar to the method used by the Environment Agency to assess biological quality. Sample collection includes late spring, early summer-post flood, and autumn.