The influence of environmental variables on contaminant effects in an ephemeral wetland in central Oklahoma.

摘要

Ephemeral wetlands are characterized by temporal changes in abiotic characteristics that occur over both daily and seasonal scales. They may exhibit fluctuations in physico-chemical parameters that may either ameliorate or exacerbate contaminant effects on resident species. The goal of this study was to characterize the natural environmental variability in limnological parameters within one ephemeral wetland, on a spatial and seasonal scale, and then determine the effects of temperature, suspended solids and organic carbon on the response of two wetland species, Daphnia pulex and the calanoid Diaptomus clavipes, to a copper reference toxicant. Organisms were exposed to the metal in 48-h static renewal tests using either reconstituted laboratory water or water from the wetland that had elevated levels of both suspended solids and organic carbon. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)