Relative to their scarcity, large, deep lakes support a large proportion of the world's freshwater species. This biodiversity is threatened by human development and is in need of conservation. Direct comparison of biodiversity is the basis of biological monitoring for conservation but is difficult to conduct between large, insular ecosystems. The objective of our study was to conduct such a com...

Dietary habits of the up side-down Mochokid catfish, Synodontis membranaceus were investigated for 24 months (April 2002-March 2004, in Jebba lake, Nigeria) using frequency of occurrence, numerical, gravimetric and index of relative importance (R1) methods. The fish is euryphagus and feeds more at night. RI values indicate that 10 of the 16 food items were major diet components. The main five f...

The African chironomid Polypedilumvanderplanki Hinton, 1951 is the only chironomid able to withstand almost complete desiccation in an ametabolic state known as anhydrobiosis. The karyotypes of two allopatric populations of this anhydrobiotic chironomid, one from Nigeria and another from Malawi, were described according to the polytene giant chromosomes. The karyotype from the Nigerian populati...

The energy balance approach helps to understand the limits within which ‘predator–prey’ relationship can form, but cannot explain formation of trophic links in natural multispecies systems. A time study feeding has been developed complement it. In hypersaline Lake Moynaki (Crimea) a simple food web, there is one omnivorous species, Gammarus aequicauda, and two abundant prey, planktonic Moina sa...

Deformities and fluctuating asymmetry in chironomid larvae have been proposed as sensitive indicators of biological stress and are commonly used to assess the ecological impact of human activities. In particular, they have been associated in Chironomus riparius, the most commonly used species, with heavy metal and pesticide river pollution. In this study, the effect of lead and 4-nonylphenol on...