Taxonomic and functional responses of macroinvertebrate communities to dam construction in a non-wadeable river

Damming and impoundment are among the main flow-related alterations in rivers worldwide. However, compared to highland river sections where impacts associated with dams have been largely studied, still scarce evidence is available scientific literature for large, lowland rivers. In this study, ecological effects of a hydropower dam Po River (Italy) on taxonomic functional responses benthic macroinvertebrates were examined by comparing one station upstream downstream over six-year period. Weak not significant differences observed taxon richness, abundance community composition. By contrast, community-level proportion water velocity increased during medium high flow condition decreased low stations. Such also mirrored Flow-T index, that biomonitoring index recently developed assess hydraulic conditions Results study support adoption stressor-specific metrics biomonitoring.