Conservation Across Aquatic-Terrestrial Boundaries: Linking Continental-Scale Water Quality to Emergent Aquatic Insects and Declining Aerial Insectivorous Birds

Comparative Toxicity of Pyrethroid Insecticides to Terrestrial and Aquatic Insects

The acute toxicities of three pyrethroid insecticides (permethrin, cypermethrin, and bifenthrin) and one organophosphate insecticide (chlorpyrifos) were compared by topical application and static exposure to a variety of terrestrial and aquatic insects. Mayflies and damselflies were the most susceptible taxa tested by both exposure methods. The aquatic insects were generally more susceptible th...

Myoglobin oxygen affinity in aquatic and terrestrial birds and mammals.

Myoglobin (Mb) is an oxygen binding protein found in vertebrate skeletal muscle, where it facilitates intracellular transport and storage of oxygen. This protein has evolved to suit unique physiological needs in the muscle of diving vertebrates that express Mb at much greater concentrations than their terrestrial counterparts. In this study, we characterized Mb oxygen affinity (P50) from 25 spe...

Aquatic Insects: Hemimetabolous Insects – Plecoptera

Methyl mercury and stable isotopes of nitrogen reveal that a terrestrial spider has a diet of emergent aquatic insects.

Terrestrial spiders transfer methyl mercury (MeHg) to terrestrial consumers such as birds, but how spiders become contaminated with MeHg is not well understood. In the present study, the authors used stable isotopes of nitrogen in combination with MeHg to determine the source of MeHg to terrestrial long-jawed orb weaver spiders (Tetragnatha sp). The authors collected spiders and a variety of ot...

Variable elements of metacommunity structure across an aquatic-terrestrial ecotone

The Elements of Metacommunity Structure (EMS) framework gives rise to important ecological insights through the distinction of metacommunities into several different idealised structures. We examined the EMS in assemblages occupying a low-mountain river system in central Germany, sampled over three consecutive years. We compared the idealised distributions of assemblages in both the riparian fl...