Data from: Effects of anthropogenic salinisation on biological traits and community composition of stream macroinvertebrates.

<p>Szöcs, E., Eckhard Coring, Jürgen Bäthe, Ralf B. Schäfer (2014). Data from: Effects of anthropogenic salinisation on biological traits and community composition of stream macroinvertebrates.  Science of the Total Environment 468–469: 943–949. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969713009728</p> <p> </p> <p>Data and R-script to reproduce our findings.</p> <p>Note: Only the trait-analysis can be reproduced. Data for trait-frequencies and electric conductivity is provided within the project-folder.<br>Abundance data is propietary and cannot be provided. Nevertheless code for data-cleaning and abundance-analysis is provided here, but commented out.</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p>For further details please read the README file.</p

Effects of potash mining on river ecosystems: An experimental study

In spite of being a widespread activity causing the salinization of rivers worldwide, the impact of potash mining on river ecosystems is poorly understood. Here we used a mesocosm approach to test the effects of a salt effluent coming from a potash mine on algal and aquatic invertebrate communities at different concentrations and release modes (i.e. press versus pulse releases). Algal biomass was higher in salt treatments than in control (i.e. river water), with an increase in salt-tolerant diatom species. Salt addition had an effect on invertebrate community composition that was mainly related with changes in the abundance of certain taxa. Short (i.e. 48 h long) salt pulses had no significant effect on the algal and invertebrate communities. The biotic indices showed a weak response to treatment, with only the treatment with the highest salt concentration causing a consistent (i.e. according to all indices) reduction in the ecological quality of the streams and only by the end of the study. Overall, the treatment's effects were time-dependent, being more clear by the end of the study. Our results suggest that potash mining has the potential to significantly alter biological communities of surrounding rivers and streams, and that specific biotic indices to detect salt pollution should be developed

Saving freshwater from salts. Ion-specific standards are needed to protect biodiversity

TECNIOspring ProgramMany human activities—like agriculture and resource extraction—are increasing the total concentration of dissolved inorganic salts (i.e., salinity) in freshwaters. Increasing salinity can have adverse effects on human health (1); increase the costs of water treatment for human consumption; and damage infrastructure [e.g., amounting to $700 million per year in the Border Rivers catchment, Australia (2)]. It can also reduce freshwater biodiversity (3); alter ecosystem functions (4); and affect economic well-being by altering ecosystem goods and services (e.g., fisheries collapse). Yet water-quality legislation and regulations that target salinity typically focus on drinking water and irrigation water, which does not automatically protect biodiversity. For example, specific electrical conductivities (a proxy for salinity) of 2 mS/cm can be acceptable for drinking and irrigation but could extirpate many freshwater insect species (3). We argue that salinity standards for specific ions and ion mixtures, not just for total salinity, should be developed and legally enforced to protect freshwater life and ecosystem services. We identify barriers to setting such standards and recommend management guidelines