Assessing the effects of water and sediment quality on aquatic macro-invertebrate diversity in the Steelpoort River, Olifants River System, Limpopo Province

Abstract

In this study data was collected to establish if the water and sediment quality of the Steelpoort River has any effects on macro-invertebrate species. The Steelpoort River is a tributary of the Olifants River system but not much data about the water quality is available. The Steelpoort River is a perennial river (Ashton et al. 2001) situated west of Burgersfort and from there it flows in a north- easterly direction and converges with the Olifants River in the Drakensberg near Kromellenboog. High silt levels in the river, increases the risk of flooding and leads to the smothering of in-stream habitats resulting in loss of some invertebrate and fish species. Sampling of the water, sediment and macroinvertebrates was conducted quarterly at the Steelpoort River at five sites. One site was above the impoundment (De Hoop Dam) and the rest were below the impoundment. A handheld YSI 556™ Multi Probe System (MPS instrument and a Mettler Toledo SevenGo™ conductivity meter were used to measure the physico-chemical characteristics at the sites. The macroinvertebrates were sampled using the SASS 5 bio-assessment protocol (Goodyear & McNeill 1999, Dickens & Graham 2002). Macro-invertebrate samples were collected using a 400 mm x 400 mm SASS net with a 250 μm mesh size. The substrate was disturbed for a period of two minutes to free macro-invertebrates from the substrate. The SASS score for each site was evaluated in the field for three of the five samples. The macro-invertebrate samples were preserved in 70% ethanol and sorted to family level in the University of Limpopo’s Biodiversity laboratory. For the majority of the physico-chemical parameters the most elevated were detected downstream and lowest concentrations were detected upstream. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) indicated that there were no significant differences for electrical conductivity, salinity, and TDS, between the sites (p>0.05). There were however significant differences in the temperature, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, and pH concentrations (p<0.05). The majority of the metals and metalloids in the water (Fe, Mn, V, Co, Zn, Ba, and Cu) were highest at Tiershoek (Site1) and lowest at Steelpoort (Site 4) and Burgersfort Bridge (Site 5).The mean metal concentrations

collected showed elevated levels for chromium, copper and zinc, which were above the CCME sediment guidelines. The most abundant macroinvertebrates were from the family Ephemeroptera which are pollution sensitive and good indicators of pollution in aquatic ecosystems. When using the interpretation of the SASS 5 results from Chutter 1995, the mean Average Score Per Taxa (ASPT) scores show that the water quality for Tiershoek (Site 1) and Polopark (Site 3) is natural but the habitat diversity has been reduced. For De Hoop (Site 2) and Steelpoort (Site 4), the mean ASPT score shows that there is some deterioration in the water quality. Finally, for Burgersfort Bridge (Site 5), the mean ASPT score indicates that there is major deterioration in the water quality. Primer statistical analysis indicated that the average dissimilarity between sites showed that the highest dissimilarity was between Tiershoek (Site 1) and Burgersfort Bridge (Site 5) which was conclusive with the results from the macro-invertebrate count and SASS, indicating that there is diverse difference from upstream to downstream. CCA indicated positive correlations between nutrients detected at Steelpoort with Athericidae, Tabanidae, Gomphidae, Baetidae, Elmidae, Planaria, Psephenidae, and Libellulidae which was indicated that water chemistry characteristics exert influence on macroinvertebrates. The results showed that there is degradation of the water quality in river from upstream to downstream with more pollution tolerant species being abundant at Steelpoort (Site 4) and Burgersfort Bridge (Site 5). The most favourable season was autumn and the least summer/spring and this may be attributed to the life cycle of the macro-invertebrate communities