Biomonitoring of water quality of the Osumi, Devolli, and Shkumbini rivers through benthic macroinvertebrates and chemical parameters

Abstract

Environmental monitoring of river water quality in Albania, using biological and chemical parameters, is a fast and effective way to assess the quality of water bodies.The aim of this study was to investigate Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera and Trichoptera (EPT), Biotic index-Richness using macroinvertebrates to assess the water quality, with special reference to nutrient (phosphorus and nitrogen) levels in the Devolli, Shkumbini and Osumi rivers. Our objective was to investigate the relationships between the measures of benthic macroinvertebrate communities and nutrient concentrations to assess water quality. The rivers' benthic macroinvertebrates were collected during different seasons in 2012. The biological and chemical parameters used in the current study identified them as quick indicators of water quality assessment. The total number of macroinvertebrate individuals (n = 15,006) (Osumi river: n = 5,546 organisms; Devolli river: n = 3,469 organisms; and Shkumbini river: n = 5,991 organisms), together with the EPT group (Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera, and Trichoptera), showed that the water quality at the river stations during the above-mentioned period belonged to Classes II and III (fair water quality and good water quality, respectively). The classification of the water quality was also based on the nitrogen and total phosphorus contents. The pollution tolerance levels of macroinvertebrate taxa varied from the non-tolerating forms encountered in environments with low pollution levels to the tolerating forms that are typical of environments with considerable pollution levels.

The drivers of benthic macroinvertebrates communities along a subtropical river system: Sediments chemistry or water quality?

“…Biological monitoring is an essential component for assessing the environmental health of aquatic ecosystems (Orwin & Glazaczow, 2009; Sagova‐Mareckova et al, 2021). It is also one of the most rapid and effective methods of measuring water quality based on the presence of biological constituents in rivers, and is an important indicator of water quality status, as aquatic organisms are always subject to various environmental influences (Duka et al, 2017).…”

Preliminary data on water quality using benthic macroinvertebrates as quality indicators: a case study in the Drin River Basin, Albania

“…Clustering environmental variables is an important method for characterizing environmental variables based on their correlation matrix. FA and CA are usually used in environmental studies by different authors(Vaughan & Ormerod 2005;Qarri et al 2014;Lechner et al 2016;Duka et al 2017;Keci et al 2020) for analysing spatial and temporal variations of environmental parameters caused by natural and anthropogenic sources and evaluating water quality for drawing out meaningful conclusions. CA is used in this study.…”

Relationship between macrobenthos and abiotic characteristics of river Alaknanda in a stretch from Chamoli to Devprayag in Garhwal Himalayan region of Uttarakhand, India

“…A few researchers worked on benthic communities viz. on macroinvertebrates conservation of two Afrotropical streams (Arimoro et al, 2020), macrobenthos communities of Ghezel Ozan river in Iran (Aazami et al, 2019), on biomonitoring index of pollution assessment by using macroinvertebrates in Tropical African regions (Elias et al, 2014), on Osumi, Devolli, Shkumbini rivers in Albania (Duka et al, 2017) and on the biotic index of macroinvertebrates of Lepenci river in Kosovo (Pajtim et al, 2019). Some studies accomplished by Indian scientists are on macroinvertebrates and water quality assessment of Mahanadi river (Ganguly et al, 2018), monitoring of benthic macroinvertebrates of Dodi Tal, Uttarakhand (Singh and Sharma, 2020) and longitudinal and temporal study of snowmelt stream of Jhelum river of Kashmir (Sabha et al, 2020), Kamboj and Kamboj, (2020) studied river mining affected areas of river Ganga at Haridwar.…”