Ability of invertebrate indices to assess ecological condition on intertidal rocky shores

Macaronesian islands as promoters of diversification in amphipods: The remarkable case of the family Hyalidae (Crustacea, Amphipoda)

“…The exact number of Hyalidae species in NEA is uncertain, but at least 13 species have been reported in this region (De Broyer, Lowry, Jażdżewski, & Robert, ; Horton et al, ; Ruffo, ). Studies addressing the biology of Hyalidae are scarce (Dubiaski‐Silva & Masunari, ; Hiwatari & Kajihara, ; Tsoi & Chu, ), and in the NEA focused mostly on habitat and food preferences (Guerra‐García, Ros, Izquierdo, & Soler‐Hurtado, ; Torrecilla‐Roca & Guerra‐García, ; Vinagre et al, ). The only Hyalidae species investigated in NEA from the genetic viewpoint was Apohyale prevostii (Lobo et al, ; Raupach et al, ), but no molecular data were previously reported for the Macaronesia region.…”

Addressing a gap in the Water Framework Directive implementation: Rocky shores assessment based on benthic macroinvertebrates

“…use different parameters (density and biomass, respectively) of the communities, which have shown to be not redundant, but complementary (Vinagre et al, 2016a). In fact, their combined use in another metric (W-statistic) did not show, by far, such good performance (Vinagre et al, 2016b). Also, other metrics (e.g., AMBI, multivariate AMBI -M-AMBI) have been tested with success, showing different results when using biomass or density data, or when applying different data transformation to those parameters, in soft-bottoms (Warwick et al, 2010;Muxika et al, 2012;Cai et al, 2014).…”

“…where the indices most similar to MarMAT (RELATE, Table 3). Considering this and previous findings from Vinagre et al (2016b) where BENTIX performed better than AMBI and MEDOCC, and BENTIX_B performed better than AMBI_B and MEDOCC_B, in terms of showing high correlations (namely among these six indices) the AMBI_B, MEDOCC_B, AMBI and MEDOCC were removed from the data set previous to further analysis.…”

“…Eleven ecological indices based on macroinvertebrates were selected from Vinagre et al (2016b). These were those that performed best along the disturbance gradients at both shores, especially during summer.…”

“…These were those that performed best along the disturbance gradients at both shores, especially during summer. Summer data (collected during August and September 2011) was used as it was previously found as the better season (comparing to winter) for monitoring activities on rocky shores (Vinagre et al, 2016b(Vinagre et al, , 2017. The indices were calculated using macroinvertebrates' density (ind m -2 ) and biomass (g AFDW m -2 ) data, estimated from samples collected at three sites distancing gradually along the disturbance gradient (site 1 closest to the disturbance, site 3 farthest from the disturbance) (Figs.…”