Land use influence on the benthic macroinvertebrate communities of streams in nyangores and amala tributaries of Mara River, Kenya.
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Material Information

Title:
Land use influence on the benthic macroinvertebrate communities of streams in nyangores and amala tributaries of Mara River, Kenya.
Creator:
Minaya Maldonado, Veronica G.
Publisher:
UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education
Publication Date:
Language:
English
Physical Description:
Thesis/dissertation

Notes

Abstract:
Macro invertabrates have remained a key indicator of changes in the physical and chemical conditions of aquatic ecosystems. Due to the increase of human population and changes in land use, the Mara Basin has been under constant pressure which has most likely affected the aquatic ecosystems within the basin. This study was conducted in the upper catchment of the Mara River Basin to test the impacts of the current land use changes on the abiotic conditions and macroinvertebrate community composition. Invertebrate samples were collected in headwater streams with distinct land use types namely forest, agriculture and mixed. A total of 9006 individuals within 75 taxa belonging to 13 orders were identified from the 25 sampling sites. The most dominant orders were: Ephemeroptera 41.28%, Diptera 30.83% and Annelida 17.21%. The results of this study demonstrate that the term “Land use” and its classification into Agriculture, Forest and Mixed were a general and rough way to classify the sampling sites of the Mara streams and predict the effect on local benthic macroinvertebrate community. Although some trends describing the physical chemical conditions were recorded, sites clustered strongly with substrate type, river size and the level of anthropogenic disturbance observed at site. These variables can therefore be used as good indicators of stream degradation as they seemed to reflect the products of the change in land use and macroinvertebrate species composition varied with these in-stream characteristics

Record Information

Source Institution:
Florida International University
Holding Location:
Florida International University
Rights Management:
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Aggregations:
Mara River Basin