Springs Ecology

The planet's natural systems are increasingly affected by human activities including overexploitation of natural resources, pollution, habitat fragmentation, and introduction of invasive species. It is estimated that 60% of Earth's ecosystem services suffer degradation and are being overexploited.

In Chihuahua, in the Conchos River Basin, the presence of springs is essential for the preservation of environmental flows and riparian ecosystems; especially during the dry season and drought periods, when springs become the sole source of in-stream base flows through the system. The above requires a thorough understanding of hydrologic systems and their links with the surrounding vegetation and soil, which together generate the occurrence of springs, in order to develop viable conservation arrangements, including legal strategies and policies that promote spring recovery, restoration, and conservation. Depletion of permanent springs leads to drying of rivers, reduction of biodiversity, desertification, and in some cases extinction of endemic species.

In the Middle Conchos River Basin, there are two thermal spring systems with very special characteristics that have governed the evolution and adaptation of unique biological communities and associations. Both sites make up two remarkably similar, convergent ecosystems, which are fascinating for both its physical/chemical environments, as well as its macro-faunal components. Both systems harbor microendemic sphaeromatid isopods, cochliopid snails, mosquitofishes and pupfish, of which the latter show an exaggerated cephalic morphology, possibly an adaptation to the low levels of dissolved oxygen that prevail in both aquatic systems.

This exercise began on May 12 and 13, 2011. The Civil Association Amigos del Pandeño, together with its partners, called for an initial "Vital Signs" planning workshop with the participation of scientists, experts, natural resource managers and specialists from universities, NGOs and the private sector; in order to begin to determine baselines to implement monitoring strategies, and to define a preliminary list of "Vital Signs" that could potentially be appropriate for the springs of San Diego de Alcala and El Pandeño, in the Chihuahuan Desert. This was the first step toward developing this "Vital Signs Monitoring Program" that will allow management of these sites to safeguard its ecosystems, and the permanence of their threatened microendemisms, biodiversity, and the environmental services they provide to society, before the threats posed by climate change.

"Vital Signs" are biophysical indicators that are selected for their high degree of susceptibility to changes in the environment, allowing early detection of changes and alterations in the ecosystem. Vital Signs provide the technical / scientific elements, necessary for efficient management and to carry out restoration and mitigation works.

During the workshop, it was agreed that the purpose of a Vital Signs Monitoring Program would be the early detection of environmental changes, providing an overview of the ecological consequences thereof and hence, to determine whether these observations dictate the need for changes in ecosystems and natural resources management practices. To this end, throughout the exercise, we identified a set of environmental indicators or "Vital Signs", which were prioritized, and some of them were selected for the development of a Monitoring Program.

Additionally, in May 2011, a first bi-national "Vital Signs" workshop took place in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The workshop allowed specialists representing AMIGOS DEL PANDEÑO, A.C., PRONATURA NORESTE, A.C., WWF and CONANP a first contact with the U.S. National Park Service, in order to exchange experiences and knowledge that could be applied to ecosystems management within official and private protected areas and spring systems within the biological corridor encompassing Conchos River - Santa Elena Canyon - Maderas del Carmen in the Chihuahuan Desert; and to begin planning for the implementation and dissemination of a standardized regional monitoring system that could enable and enhance management decision making by taking adaptation and mitigation measures before climate change.

Based on the protocols for the "United States National Park Service Chihuahuan Desert Network Monitoring Program” and for the purposes of this Program, Vital Signs are defined as a set of physical-chemical, biological and ecosystem attributes and processes, inherent to the sites of interest, which are indicative of their overall state of health and the condition of their natural resources, or of those items that from an economic, social or cultural perspective are valued by the stakeholders and society as a whole; they can measure the effects caused by various stress factors, whether known or assumed, based on modeling.

Thus, Vital Signs correspond to any estimable or measurable environmental feature or attribute that reflects, and may allow diagnosing the state of health of the ecosystem. These can be "read and interpreted" at any level of ecosystem organization including landscape, biological communities, populations or genetic; and may be of the order of composition if they relate to the diversity of elements that make up the ecosystem, structural if they relate to the order and distribution kept within the ecosystem, or functional if they refer to successive stages, or natural or anthropogenic processes.

The Island of Majorca (Spain) is characterized by a Mediterranean climate and a karstic geology that favors
the formation of numerous springs and spring–fed streams on the island’s Northwester zone. Water and epilithic diatom
samples were collected from two springs and four spring–fed streams, located at altitudes ranging from 0 to 756 m a.s.l.,
in different seasons between 2005 and 2008. Water chemistry in these systems is characterized by high concentrations of
dissolved calcium and pH values ranging from 6.6 to 8.4. A total of 111 diatom taxa belonging to 40 genera were found and
the most abundant taxa were illustrated with LM and SEM. The diatom communities of the studied sites were dominated by
species such as Achnanthidium minutissimum, A. pyrenaicum, Amphora pediculus, Cymbella vulgata, Diploneis separanda,
Encyonopsis minuta, Gomphonema lateripunctatum and Navicula cryptotenella, reflecting the calcareous geological nature
of Majorca Island. In the framework of the study 22 diatom taxa, which are new for Balearic Islands were recorded, such
as Achnanthidium straubianum, Amphora indistincta, Cymbella lange–bertalotii,Encyonopsis subminuta, Karayevia kolbei,
Navicula aff.margalithii, N. reichardtiana and N. subalpina. In addition, a new freshwater diatom species belonging to the
genus Cymbopleura,C. margalefii was found in the Torrente of Deià. Cymbopleura margalefiiis described as a new species
based on LM and SEM observations, and compared with similar taxa. A checklist of the 309 diatom taxa recorded so far from
the Balearic Islands is also presented.

The Carpathians are recognized as an important area of endemism for a number of plant and animal species with complex evolutionary histories. Repetitive patterns in divergence and distribution of such endemics in the Carpathians can help to identify important core areas and autochthonous speciation events which predate Quaternary glaciations, frequently associated with deep genetic and morphological structuring. Further on, climate changes during Pleistocene have also important effects on present genetic structures in a series of organisms from here. However recent genetic divergences are not always followed by measurable morphological differences, but can help to identify important Quaternary refugia in a series of most widespread temperate species. In our study we present two case studies of divergence and distribution in Pediciidae (Insecta, Diptera) in the Carpathians. Pedicia (Amalopis) occulta and Pedicia (Crunobia) littoralis complexes are represented by species with deeply divergent morphological and/or genetic structuring in the Carpathian area in relation with continuous evolutionary changes fallowing ecosystem dynamics during the Pliocene-Pleistocene climate changes. Graduated forest-fragmentation and aridization during the Pliocene period can likely be considered as inductors of their evolutionary processes. Once they have been formed, a number of cold-stenothermic Pedicia species, like P. fusca, or P. nielseni were able to survive Quaternary glaciations in multiple extra-Mediterranean refugia in or near the Carpathian area. Their present population genetic structures reflect different levels of isolation in one or more micro-refugia in the Carpathians which are highly repetitive with a series of refugia already identified in the case of other cold-stenothermic aquatic insects (e.g., caddisflies).

Extreme disturbances eliminate aquatic biota and alter community structure and function. During a supra-seasonal drought in north-central Texas summer and fall 2006, macroinvertebrate communities from persistent groundwater-dependent macrohabitats of varying hydrology and riparian shading were investigated to study their role as invertebrate refugia and to characterize the taxonomic and functional community structure of benthic assemblages. Ash Creek was the only stream with surface flow within a 35-km radius during the drought. Two perennial and three intermittent stream sites were studied and included perennial riffles, a perennial pool, shaded disconnected pools, and disconnected pools in full sun. Riffles had significantly higher taxa richness, Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera, Trichoptera (EPT) richness, proportion of lotic taxa, and diversity than other macrohabitats. Macrohabitats were refugia for 106 benthic macroinvertebrate taxa, and perennially-flowing habitats contained 19 taxa (17.9% of total taxa) not collected in disconnected pools. Larvae and pupae of caddisflies Marilia sp., Oecetis sp., Helicopsyche sp., and riffle beetle Microcylloepus sp. larvae and adults demonstrated resistance to drought by their presence in shaded disconnected pools without surface flow for over a month. Gathering-collectors were the most dominant and taxonomically diverse functional feeding group (FFG) in all macrohabitats. Scrapers ranked second in dominance in riffles followed by predators; however, predators were the second most dominant FFG in all pool habitats. Continued over-abstraction of groundwater in the region could lead to loss of perennial riffles and pools and extirpation of lotic taxa, such as Lutrochus sp., Mayatrichia sp. and Marilia sp., and dramatically alter community structure and function.

Metacommunity ecology describes community organisation considering both environmental and spatial processes. We tested the relative importance of environmental and spatial factors on spring ostracod assemblages from four European regions characterised by different climatic conditions (e.g. aridity). Pure and shared effects of environment and space were calculated using redundancy analysis and variation partitioning. Both environmental and spatial variables significantly explain assemblage variation, although with different relevance among areas. The amount of variation explained by environmental factors decreased with increasing climate aridity. The reduced size of spring habitats makes them prone to drying events, which are more frequent in dryer climates. Frequent disturbances may lead to local extinctions followed by colonisations from nearby sites, in a source-sink dynamics. Early recolonisation leads to random assemblages and reduces the match between organisms and environmental conditions. As a consequence, a low amount of community variation can be explained by environmental variables. Conversely , the settled communities from wetter climates best fit the ecological characteristics of sites, and deterministic processes, such as species sorting, dominate the assemblages. In conclusion, in the studied regions, ostracod communities from small

To the north of the Ilgın Plain and on the southern slopes of the Gavurdağ-Karadağ massif lies Yalburt, a summer pasture settlement (a yayla) belonging to the village of Şuhut/ Çobankaya. As the story is told by the residents of Yalburt, immediately uphill from the yayla used to be a well known as Kocakuyu that had the sweetest and the coldest waters in the area. No matter how much you drew from it, its water was never lessened.

Using light (LM, including plastid characterization on fresh material) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), as well as a thorough morphological, physical, chemical, and biological characterization of the habitats, the present study aims at describing three species new to science. They belong to the genera Eunotia Ehrenb., Planothidium Round and L. Bukht., and Delicatophycus M.J. Wynne, and were found in two contrasting spring types in the northern Apennines. The three new species described differ morphologically from the most similar species by: less dense striae and areolae, and the absence of a ridge at the valve face-mantle transition (SEM feature) [Eunotia crassiminor Lange-Bert. et Cantonati sp. nov.; closest established species: Eunotia minor (Kütz.) Grunow]; narrower and shorter cells [Planothidium angustilanceolatum Lange-Bert. et Cantonati sp. nov.; most similar species: Planothidium lanceolatum (Bréb. ex Kütz.) Lange-Bert.]; barely-dorsiventral symmetry, set off ends, and lower density of the central dorsal striae [Delicatophycus crassiminutus Lange-Bert. et Cantonati sp. nov.; most similar species: Delicatophycus minutus M.J.Wynne]. Two of the three species we described are separated from the closest species by dimensions. Their description improved knowledge on two taxa (Eunotia minor s.l. and Planothidium lanceolatum s.l.) likely to be only partially resolved species complexes. We could also refine knowledge on the ecological profiles of the three newly-described species. Eunotia crassiminor sp. nov., as compared to Eunotia minor, appears to occur in colder inland waters with a circumneutral pH and a strict oligotrophy as well with respect to nitrogen. The typical habitat of Planothidium angustilanceolatum sp. nov. appears to be oligotrophic mountain flowing springs with low conductivity. Delicatophycus crassiminutus sp. nov. was observed only in limestone-precipitating springs, and is therefore likely to be restricted to hard water springs and comparable habitats where CO2 degassing leads to carbonate precipitation. Springs are a unique but severely threatened wetland type. Therefore, the in-depth knowledge of the taxonomy and ecology of characteristic diatom species is important, because diatoms are excellent indicators of the quality and integrity of these peculiar ecosystems in the face of direct and indirect human impacts.

Springs are essential components of the freshwater resources in the North Western Ghats yet they are not well studied and are under threat from ecological degradation. This study surveyed ecology and hydrogeology of five springs. Observations included geology, flora, fauna and impact of human pressures. The goal was to describe the range of ecological conditions to improve baseline understanding. Results show that spring recharge and discharge areas were found to hydrologically connect separate parts of the landscape, sometimes spanning different watersheds. While spring discharge is likely controlled in large part by catchment size and aquifer characteristics, impacts from human pressures may reduce spring discharge or water quality. Reduction in spring discharge may reduce biodiversity, particularly at the spring outlet where natural ponds or wetlands may dry up and destroy freshwater habitat. Grazing, fire, construction, pumping and fuel wood collection were common human pressure...

Water resources and associated ecosystems are becoming highly endangered due to ongoing global environmental changes. Spatial ecological modelling is a promising toolbox for understanding the past, present and future distribution and diversity patterns in groundwater-dependent ecosystems, such as fens, springs, streams, reed beds or wet grasslands. Still, the lack of detailed water chemistry maps prevents the use of reasonable models to be applied on continental and global scales. Being major determinants of biological composition and diversity of groundwater-dependent ecosystems, groundwater pH and calcium are of utmost importance. Here we developed an up-to-date European map of groundwater pH and Ca, based on 7577 measurements of near-surface groundwater pH and calcium distributed across Europe. In comparison to the existing European groundwater maps, we included several times more sites, especially in the regions rich in spring and fen habitats, and filled the apparent gaps in eastern and southeastern Europe. We used random forest models and regression kriging to create continuous maps of water pH and calcium at the continental scale, which is freely available also as a raster map (Hájek et al., 2020b; https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4139912). Lithology had a higher importance than climate for both pH and calcium. The previously recognised latitudinal and altitudinal gradients were rediscovered with much refined regional patterns, as associated with bedrock variation. For ecological models of distribution and diversity of many terrestrial ecosystems, our new map based on field groundwater measurements is more suitable than maps of soil pH, which mirror not only bedrock chemistry but also vegetation-dependent soil processes.

Most studies on springs assumed stability, and reduced seasonal changes in the biota. We focused on two macroalgae (the rhodophyte Hildenbrandia rivularis and the chrysophyte Hydrurus foetidus) to unveil their seasonal–development patterns in springs. H. rivularis cover remained virtually constant throughout the year, although seasonal fluctuations in ecophysiological parameters were detected. The most important determinant of seasonal changes in H. rivularis was shown to be the complex interplay between solar radiation (day length) and shading. Negative cross–correlation between Chl–a and shading was found to be significant but with a time lag. H. foetidus seasonal changes were evident both at the macroscopic level and in ecophysiological parameters. Interestingly, it occurred throughout the year in the spring whilst it completely disappeared in summer in a nearby glacial stream. Unexpectedly, variability of ecophysiological parameters (coefficients of variation) was shown to be 15–20% higher in H. rivularis than in H. foetidus.

New discoveries in the Eulo springs super-group, southwest Queensland, has revealed one of Australia’s richest megafauna-bearing fossil sites both in terms of preservation and abundance of remains. Recent surveys and systematic excavations have identified a vast number of sites containing numerous individuals of the world’s largest marsupial, Diprotodon, along with other megafaunal species. Based on the fauna so far collected the sites are most likely Late Pleistocene in age. Abundant small vertebrate and invertebrate fossils have also been recovered. Preliminary findings include aquatic taxa of gastropods, fish and turtles along with terrestrial taxa such as frogs, squamates, birds, rodents and marsupials. The microfauna occur in very high concentrations, comparable to specimen densities in cave fill. This is particularly unusual for open arid sites as they are significantly affected by deflation and erosion. The deposits are composed of very fine alluvial and lacustrine clays, silts, sands and some gravels formed during periods of megaspring development. The presence of crocodilians and turtles indicates sufficiently sized water bodies capable of sustaining populations of large aquatic vertebrates. Spring development appears to be associated with the Boondoona Fault and spring activity relies on a combination of local rainfall and aquifer discharge rates. Determining the pre-European development, isolation and extinction of spring habitats in relation to fault activity and recharge rates associated with intense Quaternary climatic changes is a key aim of this project. The long term isolation of Great Artesian Basin springs in the arid zone has led to the evolution of many endemic, now threatened, species. Our research will integrate the micro- and megafaunal records to determine how species became isolated and how fauna interacted with the spring systems to arrive at present day distributions, diversity and abundance.