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Broad-scale patterns in species distribution and diversity are increasingly used to identify general rules about ecological processes, but much more is known about such patterns in terrestrial systems than in freshwater settings, where most studies have been limited to a few taxa such as fish and macroinvertebrates. An international group of researchers has now extended […]
September 24, 2022
Comments Off on Favourite dragonfly haunts
Adult dragonflies are familiar, abundant and attractive features of ponds and lakes, but they are strong fliers and are often found several miles from the nearest water. Because most studies of dragonfly behaviour have been conducted in the immediate vicinity of home ponds there’s little information about the uses that dragonflies make of the surrounding […]
September 24, 2022
Comments Off on Traditional pond management pays off
Although ponds act as biodiversity hotspots in species-poor farming landscapes, agricultural intensification and the abandonment of traditional pond management practices has led to population declines in many species of invertebrates, fish and amphibians. In particular, the discontinuation of controls on sedimentation and the overgrowth of fringing vegetation produces shallow, highly shaded ponds with few aquatic […]
June 26, 2022
Comments Off on Water quality: a plankton-based treatment system
Water fleas (cladocerans) are very common in freshwater plankton and they feed by filtering small particles from currents of water generated by their modified legs. This ability led a team of Spanish researchers to investigate whether the filtration skills of water fleas can be harnessed to treat wastewater to provide an effective alternative to other […]
June 26, 2022
Comments Off on Inland waters are hotspots for methane emission
Methane is the second most important greenhouse gas, but it has a much higher global warming potential than the most important gas, carbon dioxide. Controls on methane emissions offer the best way of reducing global warming in the short term, before controls on carbon dioxide can take full effect. Currently, such action is hampered by […]
March 26, 2022
Comments Off on How riparian trees manage their water balance
In riverine ecosystems, riparian vegetation supports aquatic and terrestrial biodiversity, stabilises river banks and modulates water flow between the stream and the floodplain. However, stream channelisation has led to the widespread disconnection and loss of floodplain forests. Successful riparian restoration schemes are those that create the conditions for plants to become established and survive fluctuating […]
March 26, 2022
Comments Off on Aquatic plants regulate downstream nutrients
Just as the processes of respiration and nutrient uptake by living cells affect the chemistry of the human body, the activities of all life-forms in a body of water influence its metabolism and carbon dynamics. In freshwater streams, aquatic plants and algae are important agents of metabolism because they act as the stream’s internal source […]
December 14, 2021
Comments Off on To be continued: the legacy of the River Continuum Concept
A recent review examined the historical importance of the River Continuum Concept (RCC), which was introduced by Robin Vannote and co-workers in 1980. This concept revolutionised stream ecology research by prompting a shift from a descriptive to a predictive approach and encouraging multidisciplinary collaboration between biologists, geomorphologists and geochemists. The RCC became a key framework […]
December 14, 2021
Comments Off on Lake management: are tipping points real?
Freshwater biologists often seek to restore turbid shallow lakes dominated by phytoplankton to clear-water systems with a high abundance of submerged plants. The usual plan of operation, which is often guided by lake ecosystem modelling, is to reduce external inputs of nutrients (e.g., from agricultural runoff or urban waste streams) to a threshold level at […]
December 14, 2021
Comments Off on How big should samples of aquatic vegetation be?
When sampling aquatic vegetation what plot size should you use? Ideally, the aim should be to choose the smallest area in which the species in the plant community in question are adequately represented – in graphical terms, this is when the curve of the number of species plotted against sample area flattens out. For terrestrial […]
Freshwater Research News 
December 23, 2022
Comments Off on Global trends in macrophyte ecology