Gender identification of shovelnose sturgeon using ultrasonic and endoscopic imagery and the application of the method to the pallid sturgeon

Monthly sampling of shovelnose sturgeon Scaphirhynchus platorynchus , a biological surrogate for the endangered pallid sturgeon Scaphirhynchus albus , was conducted to develop a multi‐seasonal profile of reproductive stages. Data collected included histological characteristics of gonads from wild caught fish and laboratory and field ultrasonic and endoscopic images. These data were used to compare effectiveness of ultrasonic and endoscopic techniques at identifying gender of adult shovelnose sturgeon at different reproductive stages. The least invasive method ( i.e . ultrasound) was least effective while the most invasive ( i.e . endoscope through an abdominal incision) was the most effective at identifying shovelnose sturgeon gender. In most cases, success rate for identifying males was greater than females, with success at identifying both genders greater in more advanced reproductive stages. Concomitantly, for most months average reproductive stage was more advanced for males than females. April and May were the months with the most advanced reproductive stage, and were the months when ultrasound was most effective. Methods were also applied in the Upper Missouri River to validate their use on pallid sturgeon Scaphirhynchus albus . Ultrasound was successful at identifying pallid sturgeon gender, however, endoscopic examination through the urogenital duct was only successful at identifying pallid sturgeon gender when the urogenital duct was not opaque.     

长江三峡库区蝶类群落的物种获得率、小生境占有率及相对多度

研究于 1998～ 2 0 0 3年在库区 10个区县 ,35个调查点进行。研究时 ,库区蝴蝶的生活环境被划分为 80个小生境 ,设置样带6 6 1条 ;调查期间获得 (Sampled)蝴蝶 331种 ,10 780只个体。报道三峡库区蝴蝶群落的部分参数 :2 5 3种蝴蝶的小生境占有率低于 10 % ,占有 4 0 %以上小生境的蝴蝶只有 7种 ;在 6 0条以上样带都获得的蝴蝶有 16种 ,而在 10条以下样带内获得的蝴蝶 2 19种 ,占总数的 6 6 .2 % ;优势种 2 1个 (6 .3% ) ,常见种 12 5个 (37.8% ) ,少见种 10 3个 (31.1% ) ,罕见种 82个 (2 4 .8% ) ;相对多度高于 1%的种类 2 2个 ,仅占总数的 6 .6 % ;个体数分布的规律接近对数级数法则。三峡库区蝶类现在的分布反映了库区生境破碎化的结果 ,意味着适宜的生境斑块周围分布不适宜生境 ,种群受到面积、隔离、边缘等多种效应的影响 ,形成了现有的物种多样性及其空间格局     

Xenochironomus ceciliae (Diptera: Chironomidae), a new chironomid species inhabiting freshwater sponges in Brazil

Chironomids living inside freshwater sponges are scarcely known, particularly in the Neotropical region where most of them are to be described. Here, male and female adults, pupa and 4th instar larva of Xenochironomus ceciliae sp. n., living in freshwater sponges of the Paraná River (Brazil) are described. The larval labrum with its several densely setose or combed structures somewhat resembling the filtering structures of simuliid larvae and the predominance of fine detritus in the larval gut contents, may indicate that the larvae of Xenochironomus ceciliae sp. n. are collector-filterers and they might be favored by the aquifer systems of the sponges.     

塔里木河流域下游植物区系及生态学研究

塔里木河流域下游地区植物有30科80属122种。以双子叶植物类群占优势,其中多年生草本植物在塔里木河流域下游植物中占多数。显示了物种形成是年轻的进化类型。生态类型以旱生植物为主。占总种数的52％,这足长期适应比较干旱的自然环境的结果。该区系的温带成分占优势。地中海成分也占有一定地位。这些区系成分的植物都是干旱区荒漠植物的代表。区系地理反映了物种演化过程的历史气候、地质变化动态。查清塔里木河流域下游植物资源的数量和分布区的变迁,为该地区的植物资源保护提供科学依据。     

Creating riverine wetlands: Ecological succession, nutrient retention, and pulsing effects

Successional patterns, water quality changes, and effects of hydrologic pulsing are documented for a whole-ecosystem experiment involving two created wetlands that have been subjected to continuous inflow of pumped river water for more than 10 years. At the beginning of the growing season in the first year of the experiment (1994), 2400 individuals representing 13 macrophyte species were introduced to one of the wetland basins. The other basin was an unplanted control. Patterns of succession are illustrated by macrophyte community diversity and net aboveground primary productivity, soil development, water quality changes, and nutrient retention for the two basins. The planted wetland continued to be more diverse in plant cover 10 years after planting and the unplanted wetland appeared to be more productive but more susceptible to stress. Soil color and organic content continued to change after wetland creation and wetlands had robust features of hydric soils within a few years of flooding. Organic matter content in surface soils in the wetlands increased by approximately 1% per 3-year period. Plant diversity and species differences led to some differences in the basins in macrophyte productivity, carbon sequestration, water quality changes and nutrient retention. The wetlands continued to retain nitrate–nitrogen and soluble reactive phosphorus 10 years after their creation. There are some signs that sediment and total phosphorus retention are diminishing after 10 years of river flow. Preliminary results from the beginnings of a flood pulsing experiment in the two basins in 2003–2004 are described for water quality, nutrient retention, aboveground productivity, and methane and nitrous oxide gaseous fluxes.     

Purification processes, ecological functions, planning and design of riparian buffer zones in agricultural watersheds

Two international meetings on ecological engineering, with a focus on riparian buffer zones, served as the source for selected papers in this special issue: (1) an International Workshop on Efficiency of Purification Processes in Riparian Buffer Zones: Their Design and Planning in Agricultural Watersheds, jointly organised by Hokkaido University, Japan, the National Agricultural Research Center for Hokkaido Region, Japan, Civil Engineering Research Institute of Hokkaido, Japan, and the Institute of Geography, University of Tartu, Estonia, and held from 5 to 9 November 2001 in Kushiro City, Hokkaido, Japan; and (2) an International Conference on Ecological Engineering for Landscape Services and Products, jointly organised by the International Ecological Engineering Society (IEES) and Lincoln University, Christchurch, New Zealand, and held from 25 to 29 November 2001 in Christchurch, New Zealand. At these two meetings, altogether 94 oral presentations (17 from invited speakers) and 15 posters by representatives from 21 countries were presented. The editorial paper highlights trends in investigation of the purification processes in riparian buffer zones as well as planning, design and management aspects of riparian buffers regarding the wide spectrum of their ecological functions; it characterises the two international meetings which served as sources for the selected papers and briefly explains the main aspects of these papers.     

Zooplankton of turbid and hydrologically dynamic prairie rivers

1. Compared with rivers in more humid, forested ecoregions of eastern and midwestern U.S.A., rivers in semi‐arid grassland of the U.S. Great Plains tend to be relatively shallow, more variable in discharge, and characterised by high suspended sediment loads. Although critical life stages of fish in prairie rivers probably depend at least partially on zooplanktonic food, data on community and distributional patterns of potamoplankton in these widespread ecosystems are almost entirely absent. 2. We examined summer zooplankton distribution in five prairie rivers (Arkansas, Kansas, Platte, Elkhorn, and Niobrara Rivers) spread over six degrees of latitude during 2003–2004. We compared our results from 126 samples with previously collected data from the Ohio and St Lawrence Rivers in forested ecoregions and correlated differences with abiotic environmental conditions. 3. The importance of hydrological retention zones to stream biota has been recently demonstrated for rivers with quasi‐permanent islands and slackwater regions, but the importance of slackwaters formed by ephemeral sandbar islands in prairie rivers is unknown. We evaluated the role of hydrological retention for planktonic rotifers, cladocera, and copepods in the Kansas River during the summer of 2004. 4. Zooplankton assemblages were extremely similar among prairie rivers (Sorensen Dissimilarity Index: mean = 0.07) but moderately disparate for comparisons of prairie versus forested‐basin rivers (mean = 0.50). 5. Total zooplankton densities in prairie rivers (approximately 81 L^?1) were intermediate between the Ohio (approximately 92 L^?1) and St Lawrence Rivers (approximately 43 L^?1), but relative abundances were significantly different. Rotifers represented >99% of zooplankton individuals in grassland rivers, but only approximately 37–68% in other rivers. Rotifer species richness was lower in prairie rivers, but relative abundances of common genera were much less skewed compared with eastern rivers where Polyarthra dominated rotifer assemblages (41–73%). 6. For comparisons among rivers, rotifers were significantly more abundant in turbid rivers, while microcrustaceans were less dense. However, for comparisons within the Kansas River over time, rotifer densities were inversely related to turbidity. We hypothesise that rotifers indirectly benefit from river turbidity because their food competitors (cladocera) and predators (e.g. cyclopoid copepods and visually feeding fish) are relatively more susceptible to suspended sediments. 7. Crustacean densities were positively related to the degree of hydrological retention (negatively to current velocities) throughout the study, but rotifer densities were significantly depressed by current velocities only when river discharge was high, making slackwaters that much more valuable. Ephemeral sandbars may not provide sufficient hydrological retention in time and space to sustain viable crustacean populations, but they are adequate to help sustain growth of rotifer populations.     

Selection and validation of reference sites in small river basins

Type-specific reference conditions that describe sites with no or only very minor anthropogenic disturbances are a basic requirement of the European Water Framework Directive. The reference condition approach implies a previous determination of criteria acceptable for the definition of near-natural stretches. In this paper, a methodology based on selection and validation procedures is applied to a Portuguese watershed to guide the identification of reference sites. The methodology consisted of three phases: (1) a preliminary site inspection through the use of maps, available data and an extensive screening field campaign that resulted in the selection of 52 potentially undisturbed small- and medium-sized rivers stretches, ranging from 43 to 1069 m in altitude, with catchment areas between 4 and 641 km² and representing siliceous and calcareous riverbeds; (2) a detailed site selection based on ten pre-defined criteria involving physical/social/biological attributes that indicated catchment land use changes and alien vegetal riparian species as major human impacts; (3) a site validation procedure involving detailed investigation of benthic macroinvertebrate communities, riparian vegetation, in-stream habitat quality and chemical parameters that showed riparian wood-related problems as a major restriction to validate a stretch as a near-natural site. Only about 12% of all investigated river sites, accounting for 600 m of all 5200 m studied, could be considered as near-reference stretches or sites retaining essential natural functions. Selection and validation procedures can identify different sites as reference, which reinforces the need for applying both procedures. The results presented can help to accomplish the requirements of the EU – Water Framework Directive by selecting reference sites as the first step to establish biological reference conditions and, simultaneously, to form a basis for nature conservation strategies. Electronic supplementary material Electronic supplementary material is available for this article at and accessible for authorised users.     

河口地区牡蛎礁的生态功能及恢复措施

在许多温带河口区,牡蛎礁是具有重要生态功能的特殊生境。牡蛎礁在净化水体、提供栖息生境、保护生物多样性和耦合生态系统能量流动等方面均具有重要的功能。近100年来,由于过度采捕、环境污染、病害和生境破坏等原因,许多温带河口区牡蛎种群数量持续下降,河口生态系统的结构与功能受到破坏,富营养化越来越严重。为了修复河口生态系统、净化水质和促进渔业可持续发展,近20年来,世界各地开展了一系列牡蛎礁的恢复活动,尤其美国在东海岸及墨西哥湾建立了大量的人工牡蛎礁,许多研究结果证实,构建的人工牡蛎礁经过2~3年时间,就能恢复自然生境的生态功能。本文介绍了我国首次牡蛎增殖放流工程-长江口南北导堤牡蛎礁,近2年的监测结果显示,长江口导堤牡蛎种群数量快速增长,附近水生生态系统的结构与功能得到明显改善。最后,针对目前牡蛎礁恢复过程中存在的不足,提出了需进一步研究的课题,包括牡蛎基础生物学(病害和分子系统进化),牡蛎礁恢复的关键技术、科学程序及成功的评价标准等。     

塔里木河上游土地利用变化中的生态价值损益分析

利用1990和2000年2期TM影像,对塔里木河上游典型绿洲的土地利用面积变化进行了研究,在土地利用变化背景下,通过货币化生态服务功能,揭示塔里木河上游典型绿洲生态价值的变化。研究表明,1990~2000年研究区土地利用变化显著。农田、居民点、盐碱地大面积增加,草地、林地、水域、湿地都有不同程度的减少;10年间研究区生态价值为负增长,减少了1.055×109元,由于土地利用变化而造成的生态价值损失巨大,而国民生产总值增加了3.652×109元。不顾生态环境的损失,盲目追求经济的增长,最终无法实现经济与社会的最大效益。评估区域生态价值,并将其纳入区域环境与经济综合核算体系意义重大。