The sustainability issues related to food security and use of land, water and energy resources provide impetus to develop treatment technologies that are sensitive to these issues. To advance tropical studies, with an emphasis on sustainability, a small pilot-scale integrated wastewater treatment facility, was designed and built on a small farm in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta (Colombia). The system consists of a septic tank, followed in series, by 5 subsurface-flow wetlands, a single surface-flow wetland and a terminal storage lagoon. The efficiency of the pilot plant was studied over a three-year period to evaluate water quality dynamics as a function of hydraulic loading rate, elapsed time and vegetation management. The objective of this study (year II), was to evaluate the comparative efficacy of the treatment units, planted with tomatoes (Lycopersicum sculentum). The results revealed the 5-day biological oxygen demand (BOD 5) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal efficiencies were above 41%, coliform bacteria removal was 46-81%. No ammonium nitrogen (NH 4 +-N) removal (< 1%) and phosphorus removal PO 4 −3-P was of 10%. A relatively high production of tomatoes (730 g/m 2) was obtained in comparison to a traditional crop in a tropical country. These preliminary results will aid in formulating technical design criteria and operational guidelines of constructed wetland technologies for treatment and reuse of domestic wastewater below tropical conditions.
The Neotropical free-living freshwater cyclopoid copepod Mesocyclops paranaensis Dussart & Frutos, 1986 was found in a small temporal pond in La Guajira, northern Colombia. Hitherto, it has been reported from Argentina, Paraguay, and Brazil. This is the first record of this species in Colombia, its northernmost finding in South America, and the fourth locality in which this species has been recorded from. Mesocyclops paranaensis can be distinguished from its closest congeners by a unique combination of the characters of the female, including: 1) leg 4 intercoxal sclerite with two large, acute projections; 2) P3, P4 intercoxal sclerite caudal surface lightly pilose; 3) seminal receptacle with narrow lateral arms and weakly convex anterior margin; 4) second antennary endopodite with seven setae, and insertion of antennary exopodal seta with adjacent spinules; 5)frontal surface of P1 basipodite ornamented with long spinules; 6) posterior margin of anal somite with continuous row of spinules; and 7) inner margin of caudal ramus hirsute. The Colombian population shows some subtle morphological differences with respect to previous reports.
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