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Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity

BACKGROUND: Large-scale inter-basin water transfer (IBWT) projects are commonly proposed as solutions to water distribution and supply problems. These problems are likely to intensify under future population growth and climate change scenarios. Scarce data on the distribution of freshwater fishes fr...

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Autores principales: Grant, Evan H. Campbell, Lynch, Heather J., Muneepeerakul, Rachata, Arunachalam, Muthukumarasamy, Rodríguez-Iturbe, Ignacio, Fagan, William F.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2012
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3314595/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22470533
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0034170
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author Grant, Evan H. Campbell
Lynch, Heather J.
Muneepeerakul, Rachata
Arunachalam, Muthukumarasamy
Rodríguez-Iturbe, Ignacio
Fagan, William F.
author_facet Grant, Evan H. Campbell
Lynch, Heather J.
Muneepeerakul, Rachata
Arunachalam, Muthukumarasamy
Rodríguez-Iturbe, Ignacio
Fagan, William F.
author_sort Grant, Evan H. Campbell
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Large-scale inter-basin water transfer (IBWT) projects are commonly proposed as solutions to water distribution and supply problems. These problems are likely to intensify under future population growth and climate change scenarios. Scarce data on the distribution of freshwater fishes frequently limits the ability to assess the potential implications of an IBWT project on freshwater fish communities. Because connectivity in habitat networks is expected to be critical to species' biogeography, consideration of changes in the relative isolation of riverine networks may provide a strategy for controlling impacts of IBWTs on freshwater fish communities. METHODS/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Using empirical data on the current patterns of freshwater fish biodiversity for rivers of peninsular India, we show here how the spatial changes alone under an archetypal IBWT project will (1) reduce freshwater fish biodiversity system-wide, (2) alter patterns of local species richness, (3) expand distributions of widespread species throughout peninsular rivers, and (4) decrease community richness by increasing inter-basin similarity (a mechanism for the observed decrease in biodiversity). Given the complexity of the IBWT, many paths to partial or full completion of the project are possible. We evaluate two strategies for step-wise implementation of the 11 canals, based on economic or ecological considerations. We find that for each step in the project, the impacts on freshwater fish communities are sensitive to which canal is added to the network. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Importantly, ecological impacts can be reduced by associating the sequence in which canals are added to characteristics of the links, except for the case when all 11 canals are implemented simultaneously (at which point the sequence of canal addition is inconsequential). By identifying the fundamental relationship between the geometry of riverine networks and freshwater fish biodiversity, our results will aid in assessing impacts of IBWT projects and balancing ecosystem and societal demands for freshwater, even in cases where biodiversity data are limited.
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spelling pubmed-33145952012-04-02 Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity Grant, Evan H. Campbell Lynch, Heather J. Muneepeerakul, Rachata Arunachalam, Muthukumarasamy Rodríguez-Iturbe, Ignacio Fagan, William F. PLoS One Research Article BACKGROUND: Large-scale inter-basin water transfer (IBWT) projects are commonly proposed as solutions to water distribution and supply problems. These problems are likely to intensify under future population growth and climate change scenarios. Scarce data on the distribution of freshwater fishes frequently limits the ability to assess the potential implications of an IBWT project on freshwater fish communities. Because connectivity in habitat networks is expected to be critical to species' biogeography, consideration of changes in the relative isolation of riverine networks may provide a strategy for controlling impacts of IBWTs on freshwater fish communities. METHODS/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Using empirical data on the current patterns of freshwater fish biodiversity for rivers of peninsular India, we show here how the spatial changes alone under an archetypal IBWT project will (1) reduce freshwater fish biodiversity system-wide, (2) alter patterns of local species richness, (3) expand distributions of widespread species throughout peninsular rivers, and (4) decrease community richness by increasing inter-basin similarity (a mechanism for the observed decrease in biodiversity). Given the complexity of the IBWT, many paths to partial or full completion of the project are possible. We evaluate two strategies for step-wise implementation of the 11 canals, based on economic or ecological considerations. We find that for each step in the project, the impacts on freshwater fish communities are sensitive to which canal is added to the network. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Importantly, ecological impacts can be reduced by associating the sequence in which canals are added to characteristics of the links, except for the case when all 11 canals are implemented simultaneously (at which point the sequence of canal addition is inconsequential). By identifying the fundamental relationship between the geometry of riverine networks and freshwater fish biodiversity, our results will aid in assessing impacts of IBWT projects and balancing ecosystem and societal demands for freshwater, even in cases where biodiversity data are limited. Public Library of Science 2012-03-28 /pmc/articles/PMC3314595/ /pubmed/22470533 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0034170 Text en This is an open-access article, free of all copyright, and may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose. The work is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 public domain dedication. https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Public Domain declaration, which stipulates that, once placed in the public domain, this work may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose.
spellingShingle Research Article
Grant, Evan H. Campbell
Lynch, Heather J.
Muneepeerakul, Rachata
Arunachalam, Muthukumarasamy
Rodríguez-Iturbe, Ignacio
Fagan, William F.
Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity
title Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity
title_full Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity
title_fullStr Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity
title_full_unstemmed Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity
title_short Interbasin Water Transfer, Riverine Connectivity, and Spatial Controls on Fish Biodiversity
title_sort interbasin water transfer, riverine connectivity, and spatial controls on fish biodiversity
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3314595/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22470533
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0034170
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