Abstract

Members of the meiobenthos have been used extensively to determine the effects of anthropogenic perturbation in marine systems (Coull & Chandler, 1992). Despite this, the meiofauna has been virtually excluded from freshwater pollution monitoring. This thesis aimed to address this research caveat, by evaluating the potential of stream meiofauna for monitoring metal-contamination. Meiofaunal communities were sampled from streams in SW England representing a gradient in metal contamination. Environmental variables in these streams were also measured to identify the important forcing agents structuring the stream benthos. Multivariate techniques demonstrated Cu, either alone or in combination with other environmental variables was of most importance in correlations with the composition of meiofaunal communities. Comparison with the macrofaunal data demonstrated that both components of the benthos responded in a similar way to metal contamination, although the meiofauna also highlighted other differences in water chemistry. The combination of meiofauna, macrofauna and temporary meiofauna in a combined metazoan community analysis gave the best discrimination of sites. Detection of metal-contamination was retained in meiofaunal data aggregated to the family level. The abundances of the harpacticoid copepod Bryocamptus zschokkei were consistently important in contributing to between-site differences in community structure. The harpacticoid, therefore was selected as an ecologically-relevant freshwater toxicity test for Cu. Laboratory experiments demonstrated that Cu had toxic effects on the survival and reproduction of Bryocamptus zschokkei. Although acute toxicity tests gave more rapid results, these effects on survival occurred at a higher Cu concentration than those in the chronic tests. Sub-lethal concentrations of Cu led to a reduction in the numbers of offspring per brood Animals with pre-exposure to chronic concentrations of Cu exhibited greater tolerance to this metal. In conclusion, more information may be gained by including the meiofauna, alongside the macrofauna, when monitoring the impact of contaminants on freshwater systems. To reduce the effort of processing samples it appears family level data could be used to detect metal-contamination. The novel use of B. zschokkei in laboratory tests, where it showed lethal and sub-lethal responses to Cu, demonstrated that this species may have much potential as an ecologically-relevant freshwater bioassay organism for this metal. The advantages of using meiofaunal species such as B. zschokkei as toxicity test organisms are discussed.

Document Type

Thesis

Publication Date

1998

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